In 2025, Open House Lisboa approached the Open House Europe theme, Future Heritage, by inviting the public to look more closely at the visible and invisible structures that shape Lisbon’s urban identity. By opening the doors to 72 carefully selected sites—including bridges, houses, tunnels, palaces, and essential infrastructures—the festival encouraged visitors to uncover the layers of invention that define the city. This year’s programme reflected a broader understanding of heritage as something in constant transformation. Rather than seeing Lisbon’s built environment solely as a record of the past, the festival highlighted how the city is the result of ongoing reinvention, where past, present, and future intersect.

Through the lens of this year’s curatorial approach, The Invention of Lisbon, the festival created a natural connection to Future Heritage. It showed how architecture can serve simultaneously as an archive of what has been and a foundation for what is yet to come, encouraging a deeper reflection on how we define, reinterpret, and carry forward the legacy of our cities in an ever-changing world. Although the majority of participating sites spoke to this overarching theme, Open House Lisboa highlighted five particularly emblematic examples: the Patriarchal’s Reservoir, Torre do Tombo Archive, Ritz Hotel, Matinha Gasometers, and the National Pantheon. In addition to these places, four urban tours led by specialists from different fields extended the theme into the city’s streets, offering diverse ways of experiencing Lisbon’s evolving heritage.

The Accessible Hill

The Accessible Hill walk centred on a new dynamic that promotes soft mobility, inclusive access, and the use of public transport. Recognising the need to rebalance accessibility between the lower part of the city and Castle Hill, the walk emphasised the role of the city’s topography as a guide. The hill itself reveals its needs, creating opportunities to rethink circulation and to link new routes with existing transport networks—metro, trains, trams, river connections, and buses—as well as public car parks and established paths.

The proposed access routes (A1/Sé, A2/Graça, B1/Alfama, and B2/Mouraria) are interconnected with various public programmes, including a parish council, creative hub, social centre, and viewpoints. Together, they form a more fluid and natural movement pattern, revitalising the hill and making it more appealing to residents and visitors alike. By re-examining mobility as a shared urban value, the walk reflected on how accessibility itself becomes part of a city’s future heritage.

National Pantheon

As a monumental building deeply rooted in Portuguese history and identity, the National Pantheon represents a traditional understanding of heritage. Yet, its inclusion in the programme also raised questions about how iconic structures remain relevant within contemporary urban life. By opening its doors in the context of Open House Lisboa, the Pantheon became part of an active conversation about how we interpret and activate historical architecture today.

This engagement not only reinforces collective memory but also encourages us to imagine how sites like the Pantheon might evolve, be repurposed, or inspire new forms of civic life. In doing so, the tours demonstrated how heritage is not fixed: even the most monumental buildings can adapt and contribute to future cultural landscapes.

Lisbon Riverside

Tracing the Walls of Lisbon Riverside as once described by Vieira da Silva in 1900, this urban walk offered a unique lens through which to explore Future Heritage. By revisiting a historically significant area now transformed by contemporary urban renewal, the tour invited reflection on the architectural and infrastructural layers that shape Lisbon’s evolving identity.

The extensive transformation of the waterfront—driven by coordinated efforts between national and local authorities—illustrates how heritage is continuously negotiated and reshaped to meet present and future needs. By questioning the sequence, authorship, and social appropriation of these developments, the walk highlighted the dynamic relationship between memory and innovation. It showed how even recently developed spaces can carry cultural meaning and become part of the legacy passed on to future generations.