Hydra

CORTEN steel

Unbuilt project
2022

HYDRA is more than a sculpture — it is a living system, a beacon for the future of cities. Designed to collect, store, and redistribute rainwater, HYDRA transforms a vital natural resource into a symbol of renewal, sustaining parks, gardens, and urban farms. As a work of public art, it invites communities to imagine a new urban ecology, one that is resilient, regenerative, and deeply connected to the rhythms of nature.

Conceived for the Lisbon metropolitan area, HYDRA is also a prototype for a global movement toward climate-adaptive cities. In a world where droughts are growing more frequent and severe — threatening food security, deepening poverty, and widening inequalities, as the United Nations warns — innovations like HYDRA point the way forward. Nowhere is this more urgent than in the Iberian Peninsula, where Portugal stands on the frontlines of water scarcity.

By 2050, with the global population surging toward 10 billion, urban water demand will rise by 55%. Yet despite technological progress, cities remain among the planet’s most unsustainable systems, struggling to steward the natural resources they depend on. The future will belong to cities that rethink their relationship with water — not as a commodity to be consumed, but as a sacred, life-giving force to be nurtured and shared.

HYDRA embodies this vision. It offers not just a solution, but a manifesto: for cities that are greener, wiser, and more alive.