The Portuguese sidewalk: drawings on the archive

Abstract

As a result of the ability to use and manipulate materials in accordance with architectural, engineering and sociocultural context requirements, geological materials have been an essential element in the  construction of cities due to their different  characteristics and properties.
Made through a unique application and the result of an art of working the stone, the so-called “Portuguese sidewalk” has been an object of admiration since the beginning of its application in Lisbon, in the mid-19th century. This Documenta intends to disclose a selected set of sources about the drawing of the Portuguese  sidewalk, from the Lisbon Municipal Archive, dividing it into two large groups: of decorative nature and  informative or commercial scope. The examples  presented here are archival testimonies of material and  symbolic manifestations of the image of the city that is  intended to be underlined and whose memory we wish  to recover.