- Architecture & development
Modern elements are alternated with traditional elements in this distinctive house by António Costa Lima Arquitectos. The residence has no less than three enclosed gardens and almost all around the building a covered gallery. Hopscotch is the equally crazy name of this project.
António Costa Lima Arquitectos is a Portuguese architecture firm that despite a name change in 2012 (formerly called L Arquitectos) already exists for twenty-seven years. The team is composed of a passionate group of architects who design creative solutions for all kinds of projects. This creativity is sensible in their project Hopscotch, a house in Comporta. Hopscotch refers to a children's game where you have to jump from one rectangle drawn on the ground to another on one leg. When you see the floor plan of Hopscotch, you understand why the project was given this name; the house seems to consist of rectangles that became three-dimensional. The floor plan is inspired by a hopscotch path and a chessboard pattern.
The architects opted for a collection of smaller huts in a chessboard pattern.
Three volumes in Hopscotch are inner gardens, so there is an alternation of inner and outer volumes like there is on a chessboard between black and white. The materiality of the design is based on a traditional hut from the region mixed with modern elements. The shape of the house is also inspired by a hut, but instead of building a large hut, the architects opted for a collection of smaller huts in a chessboard pattern. 
The volume of the modular house is disrupted by the inner gardens, making it difficult to grasp the entirety of the house. These disruptions provide a lot of natural light and create a light and shadow pattern in the interior. The house is situated in an organic sand and plant garden. A wooden deck surrounds the building and has pathways leading from the street to the far end of the property. From the crazy pattern to the unique location, we can say that Hopscotch is a completely new interpretation of the traditional hut. António Costa Lima Arquitectos created this complex house with a visible passion for architecture. 
Photography: André Pinto da Cunha and António Costa Lima