Centro Cultural de Belém

This guide to the Centro Cultural de Belém in Lisbon traces the 1988 competition that pit fifty-seven architectural teams against the challenge of building beside the five-hundred-year-old Jerónimos Monastery. You'll hear how Vittorio Gregotti and Manuel Salgado won the commission, why Portugal needed a stage in a hurry for its 1992 EU presidency, and how they answered a World Heritage neighbor by building in the same pale limestone. Look for the patios where the complex's internal streets cross and the monastery comes back into view.