While many European countries were involved in the post-war architectural debate, Portugal was “proudly alone”*, lingering in its colonial war under a fascist dictatorship. But in 1974, a democratic revolution and two years of internal turmoil perpetrated by extremist political movements competing for power led to governments of social-democratic inspiration. European financial aid started as early as 1975 and the cash flow that succeeded Portugal´s accession to European Economic Community, in 1986, meant the consolidation of a nation´s illusion of a happily ever after marriage to old prohibitions. Plus, for the first time in its history, the welfare state was actually promoted. Although gradually becoming massively popular, the architecture course until 1986 was taught merely at the state schools of Oporto and Lisbon, the capital. These two schools represent, in a way, the contrast between what happened to architectural culture in the years from 1975 to 1995: although supported by the State, they endorsed two radically different attitudes toward the deregulation of practice, which still – and for a long time – allowed many other professionals the design of a rapidly urban growth. Today, both Álvaro Siza Vieira and Eduardo Souto de Moura, from the Oporto School, honor Portuguese architecture with two Pritzker. The School of Lisbon adds to a very significant corps of respected architects names like Aires Mateus and Carrilho da Graça; however, the curricula of this School is cast out of the collective memory, as if cursed by its own assets. This paper will base its arguments on ongoing research for a PhD that aims to unfold the meaning of the Lisbon School of Architecture (FAUTL) in Portuguese culture. Particularly in what postmodernism and politics are concerned, it will (1) emphasize the pertinence of going as far back as to the classroom to understand the fundamentals of the involvement of architects-practitioners as crucial to their students´ careers and their country´s development in the long term; it will also (2) argue – sustained by archives, testimonies and bibliography - how the duality of attitudes against or forward the liberalization – political and pedagogically speaking – may have been determinant to how a Portuguese architectural culture has evolved so forth.

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