VILA NOVA DE PAIVA URBAN PARK
The new parks, with an urban motivation and genesis, but located within a rural and strong scenic context, lie in the heart of the Beira Alta region, in the area north-east of Viseu, with their wild and lush regions, of accentuated relief, and very agrarian and traditional. Between the hardness of the Montemuro hills and the bare cliffs of Lapa, stand the Leomil hills, with the river Paiva and its Côvo affluent – just above the ancient natural border of Vouga, which here separates the “World of the North” from the spaces of the south-west peninsular. Vila Nova de Paiva is the urban centre near the river of the same name, which centralises the administrative management of the countryside containing environmental and functional values in harmony with nature, which the author sought to recover, through a holistic vision where these interventions could redesign the Portuguese “rural landscape”.