Igreja de São José, Coimbra: história da sua construção

The Church of S. José in Coimbra, inaugurated on March 19, 1962, owes its lines to the architect Álvaro da Fonseca, at the time an official of the Direcção Geral dos Serviços de Urbanização. The history of its construction was marked by the many setbacks that happened since, in 1939, it was decided to replace the then recently opened, but already too small, Church of S. José do Calhabé. After a first study by the architect Alfredo Duarte Leal Machado was rejected, in 1945 the architect Januário Godinho was invited to elaborate the project of the new church. The modernity of its project, inspired by recent French models, gave rise to a discussion paradigmatic of the existing dispute in Portugal regarding the architectural models that should be built in this country. On the one hand, the defenders of modern models-such as the architect Porfírio Pardal Monteiro, who voted alone in favor of the Januário Godinho project; on the other, the defenders of “Português Suave”, a supposedly national architecture, defended by the Minister of Public Works, who elected the neo-traditionalist churches of Caldas da Rainha and Bombarral, as models to follow.