Government prepares €16.5 million fit-out for former CGD building

The government has approved a €16.5 million interior refit and refurbishment of one of Lisbon’s most iconic buildings which for years has served as the headquarters of the State-owned bank Caixa Geral de Depósitos and now houses several government ministries.

The building, a veritable temple to money with clear religious iconographic influences of gothic cathedrals, ancient Egyptian pylons and greco-roman temples, called Campus XXI in Lisbon (On Avenida João XXI) is to be fitted out to become a cathedral to government.

Several government departments are already installed and the bank has yet to move to its new purpose-built office in the city’s Parque das Nações, but the works are considered essential to increase the capacity of the space and modernise the premises built between 1987 and 1993 in what was then one of the most ambitious architectural projects in the city of the time.

Monumental in size, an echo of the excesses and loads of money culture of the late 1980s, there is also more than a passing resemblance to the neo-classical architectural features and lines of the infamous architect Albert Speer whose bold and gigantesque plans for a new Berlin in the late 1930s never materialised.

The building was designed by the Portuguese architect Arsénio Cordeiro, who also built Lisbon’s national archive Torre do Tombo and was a breeder of Lusitano thoroughbred horses.

The plan to concentrate several ministries under one roof is part of a reform of the Central Administration of the State involves “the adaptation of spaces formerly occupied by Caixa Geral so that they can be made available for government ministries and departments, concentrating them in one space for greater efficiency, agility and maximization of resources, as well as freeing up existing public buildings used by government entities for housing and offices.”

In July of last year, António Leitão Amaro, Minister of the Presidency of Portugal, said that this change is also “an opportunity to save taxpayers money. It is estimated that in a normal year, €19 to €20 million are saved in costs of space, rent, logistics, cleaning, security, electricity, and car fleet alone,” reads a government statement. The concentration on Campus XXI “will allow the release of three buildings leased to private individuals” and another “27 state buildings that can be put to various uses at the service of the people.”

This change will allow “a better response capacity. We work more together, in a more coordinated manner, giving better answers faster and in a more participatory and collaborative way,” Leitão Amaro said at the time.