CONFERENCE: HOUSING – A CRITICAL PERSPECTIVE Architecture_MPS; Liverpool University; Liverpool John Moores University Liverpool: 08—09 April, 2015 1 LONG AFTER THE RING, MASS HOUSING MAY NOT BE APOCALYPTICAL MÓNICA PACHECO AUTHOR AFFILIATION: SCTE-IUL / DINÂMIA-CET, LISBON, PORTUGAL INTRODUCTION Charles Jencks proclaimed the “Death of Modern Architecture”, metaphorically through the demolition of the Pruitt-Igoe housing estate (1972), more than 40 years ago, - precisely at a time when the private sector started to take over the welfare state almost everywhere. The contradiction between claiming an “architecture for the people” while an economic-driven market was being promulgated, obliterating the moral ambitions of architecture, is outlined in the case study of the present paper, the urban plan of Portela de Sacavém (1960-79), designed by architect Fernando Silva (1914-83). The project is a mass-produced housing complex − one of the principles of Modern Architecture – developed by the private sector 1 , in the outskirts of Lisbon, for the upper middle class. 2 Built over the 60’s and 70’s, the project is paradigmatic of a self-representing image that arrived in the capital from the ex-colonies and was “broadcasted” for and by the emergent middle class at the time – paradoxically linked with the provision of cheap houses for the working classes. The idea of a modern lifestyle was welcome. It included the car, the garage, the lift, the motorway, and even the stereotyped anonymous character of architecture - as opposed to the ‘ideal’ of detached suburban houses with private gardens. But, despite the modern character of the urban plan, the dwellings enclose a bourgeois Victorian vision of how private life should be lived. Given its wide acceptance and the satisfaction of its inhabitants – many of them still living there – it became the model of the housing approach in the years to come. Thus, this paper will argue that “housing for the biggest number” in the periphery of cities is not necessarily synonymous of ‘miserabilism’, as is the case with countless examples elsewhere. 1 In this case it was the influent constructor and promotor Manuel da Mota. 2 The word Portela means precisely “door”, in this case a Lisbon “door” to Sacavém.