Paula Moucheira

At 17, she started studying Biology. It was at this time that she discovered descriptive geometry, which attracted her to architecture. In 1979, she started studying Fine Arts. However, it was during the five intense years of her architecture degree that Paula Moucheira felt the most at home. She began her career at the Tec-Tur studio, which focussed on luxury projects. Later, she was self-employed for 15 years. And in 2008, there was a turning point. The architect joined the family business (the company was founded in the 1940s) and Formas de Pedra came into being, dedicated to marble extraction. The result is design pieces in colours such as grey, brown, pink and black. And a variety of unique products. Here is the company’s CEO.  

When did Paula’s life story merge with the story of Formas de Pedra?
This story, told up until 2008, continues with two very decisive facts. Firstly, the lack of architectural commissions, a consequence of the financial situation in the country and in the Western world, which led to a lack of confidence and a crisis in the construction industry. Secondly, the reorganisation of assets in my father’s family due to inheritance issues. In this new reality, I was called upon to be present and to be part of a new marble extraction company: this is how Formas de Pedra came about. 

The company is specialised in marble extraction. What qualities do we find in Formas de Pedra that set it apart from other companies in the sector?
Formas de Pedra came about with one concern and my second biggest challenge: to take care of all the marble extracted, giving it its due value and helping to change quality standards, adding value through design, new uses and thinking up new products. This is what justifies the name we chose. This is why Formas de Pedra stands out from other companies in the sector.
The quarry is located in Pardais, Vila Viçosa. The marble from this area is characterised by its fine crystallisation and the inclusion of other minerals which are expressed in colours such as greys, browns, pinks and blacks. It is very important to be aware that marble is a metamorphic rock, which changes over the millennia, always integrating what is around it and within the mineral masses, as it follows the tectonic movements of the earth’s crust. And the process of breaking up the banks of rock allows these movements of metamorphosis to be seen. It is from this understanding of this natural resource and its richness that the concern arises to convey this beauty and to break down pre-established standards, such as quality criteria and the purity of colour. These standards are the result of a lack of understanding on the part of the people selling it, consumers and often the people who extract this raw material, because they don’t have the strength to create trends and value what they take from the earth. 

In order to ensure quality and premium service to customers, we need to be equipped with technology and innovation. Is this the case with your company?
Technology, yes, but always to extend the life of the equipment as much as possible, for obvious reasons: cost of acquisition and cost of maintenance. Innovation, yes, but always in relation to the attitude towards quarrying and the reluctance to discard marble because it is "ugly", because it mixes colours, knowing that this rejection of the raw material accounts for 70%, on average, of the marble extracted. 

Tell us about the new covering, VEINSTONE, what is so different about it?
VEINSTONE was a project that responded to the problem of the time, in 2014, when clients rejected marble with dark veins. Faced with this problem, we came up with the answer: if you don’t like dark veins, fine, we’ll remove the veins! And, identifying the natural pattern, we cut into the surface, cancelling out the presence of these dark veins, creating a bas-relief on the surface of the marble and respecting its natural pattern. The project was developed with the help of a materials laboratory, Frontwave, and then registered as an industrial model.

«Nature gives us so much, in a surprising way»

What do you do with waste at Formas de Pedra?
At Formas de Pedra we salvage part of the surplus raw material for a product, designed by us, and for sculpture. The rest of the 70% extracted is piled up in a heap or crushed into gravel. All the pieces at events, exhibitions and shows have been made with discarded material: Casa Decor 2016, 2017, 2018, 3 days of design 2018 in Copenhagen, and Milan Design Week 2020, using SMARBLE.  

Over time, mineral resources will become scarce. How should the extraction of these resources be reassessed?
Natural resources are not scarce. They change according to the areas where they are found and the depth at which they are extracted. The concept that artificial products that imitate marble should be consumed to avoid extraction and thus preserve a resource is a false justification. The consumption of these products will, in the future, result in an added problem: how to recycle these composites. Surplus marble can be broken up, crushed into gravel or powder and integrated into the earth without any environmental damage. It goes back to where it came from. This is not the case with composites. What I feel is that extraction should be done with a view to finding a use for all the marble extracted. If the size doesn’t fulfil the customer’s wishes, find attractive alternative forms that do.
This is where what I consider very important comes into play: the integration of creative people within companies. Whether it’s processing or extraction. Proposals and solutions will emerge as a response to problems, just like in any project programme. SMARBLE is one of our research and development projects, which arose in response to a problem: marble cracking. Instead of disguising it, the solution is to assume and emphasise this cracking in a geometric way, devised as part of the project. It was developed without any funding and has been a registered industrial model since 2019. The experimental piece produced was a bathtub, resulting in a 50% reduction in raw materials, machining times, energy and a 60% reduction in sludge production. It was a project completed with the support of LNEG, resulting from participating in CIRCO HUB Portugal, with the aim of constituting a circular design model and boosting a circular business model, produced in partnership with Eduardo D Pardal Lda. 

How do you deal with this need to use nature to produce consumer goods, thinking about the sustainability of the planet?
Nature gives us so much, in a surprising way. We have an obligation to respect it and be careful with what it gives us. Only use what is necessary and don’t waste it. What we make are not disposable consumer goods, since they are produced with timeless raw materials and with the aim of becoming circular products, either by integrating discarded raw materials, through transformation processes or by presenting customers with new ways of using them.  

What has it been like being the CEO of Formas de Pedra?
Being part of Formas de Pedra and later becoming CEO was a challenge I accepted with some reluctance, given the market situation when the company was formed. The crisis in construction, on which we naturally depended, combined with the lack of commissions in architecture, made my professional life very challenging. However, the way I carried out my profession, as an architect, was transferred to the company, and when everything calmed down in 2013, what seemed dramatic became a huge potential for innovation. I drew up a Manifesto for myself, with goals, with a programme that regulated form and function, with a communication programme, timings, everything that is defined when you start an architectural project. I wanted to tell the world that marble isn’t just about construction, it’s also about the home, the table, the garden, new products, new coverings, lighting, etc. That’s one side. The other, in extraction, I think the main changes happened in the people who worked with me, because I was a woman. The difficulty wasn’t mine. All my experience in technical site assistance had taught me how to work in industrial environments, outdoors, in cold and heat, wearing boots and a helmet. Being a woman doesn’t change anything. In the profession, we are who we are as people. It doesn’t matter if you’re a man or a woman. 

There are more and more women in business management. As a female manager yourself, does knowing this make you proud?
Knowing that there are more and more women in business management makes me proud, yes, in the sense that we are almost reaching the day when we will no longer be looking at numbers, quotas or percentages. It’s no more than what should happen, because it’s not women who do the jobs, it’s people who are qualified, capable of working and who have managed to find a stable compromise between the time they devote to their profession and their family. Just as men should. I also think that, as we educate our children as equals, we will increasingly see the cancellation of gender distinctions in the professions.