Olympia Cinema

Rehabilitation of Olympia Cinema

(Also known as Bingo Olympia since the 90's) into a restaurant and a fancy nightclub

Rua Passos Manuel, Porto

Design a disco club could be frightening and it may become a very naughty challenge. The requirements of the main public and the final purpose is the opposite of
my main beliefs on architecture.
Some keywords for a program like this are 'entertainment', 'vanity', 'excess', 'fantasy' and somehow 'performance' seeking legitimacy.
Austerity and delict may coexist, depending on the critical state of awareness of the facts and its proper resolution, as A. Loos stood for.
I'm out to read.
The Olympia Cinema was first opened to public in 1912. The social communication has announced it as a very elegant and modular space with an extreme luxurious
ambient. Throughout its 100 years of existence, it has undergone several usages and therefore profound changes in its interiors, remaining, from the original project,
only the façade.
In the 80's, the building has changed from a cinema theatre to a gambling house. At this time, it had its most deep architectural intervention, losing permanently the
fine qualities of a wide room and its ornamental richness, as it's been described in historical documents.
In the first visit, we were faced with anonymous interiors with no significant value. The change of the building’s usage to a restaurant/nightclub preserves the main
structure of the space. In the façade, we restored the original elements and we erased all the others mischaracterizing additions. On the other hand, we adapt the
interiors to the new technical requirements of the place.
Proposed modification:

1. relocate the staircase,
2. build new and full mobility toilettes,
3. divide the continuous space in two levels (ground and 1st floor)

Proposed rehabilitation:

• conception of the structuring equipments (bars and DJ box), the fixed furniture (VIP cabins) and all the residual furnishing (lamps, chairs and stools,

tables,..),

• replacement and addition of new wall and ceiling coverings required by the integrity of the acoustic work,
• new design of lighting and decor

The building has 3 floors, 2 of them above of the street’s height.
The ground and the 1st floor are public.
The ground floor is dedicated to the restaurant and the dancefloor, after dining hours. The 1st floor is occupied by the administration, private clubbings and other required multi events.

The clients’ insistent requests for decorating, shaping and colouring were recycled into the proposal of a unique and continuous wall covering. This would give us all (the shapes, the lights, and the colour) in a single element. In the centre of our concerns, a question is still not clear:

• How to materialize the answer to the high levels requirements of material resistance, durability, acoustic and security questions.

The answer:

• A skin of steel, sliced by the light ‐ RGB Led program – covering the materials of absorption acoustic. The density of this skin and the cuttings will help to the absorption of the sound ‐ already did to A. Loos.

Through the space, the same flower defines the different ceilings with distinct shapes. The outdoors were padded.

The façade, fairly well conserved, was repaired and cleaned.
Regarding the Porto's urban landscape, we have chosen the light greys. Now, Olympia also differs from the ochre next door neighbour, the Coliseum, bringing back
its singularity in the city.

November of 2014
José Carlos Nunes de Oliveira, Arch.