Andrade Morettin's Essential Architecture is designed for the city of Recife, Brazil, located in the state of Pernambuco. Recife has its history as a port city along tropical, white-sand beaches lined with palm trees, and named for the coral reefs that line the coast. It is a fast-growing urban area that has been called the "Venice of Brazil" because it is dissected by numerous waterways and connected by many bridges. The proposed site, called Morado Recife Imperial, is located in the southwest of the city about 7 km from the ‘downtown core' in the Jiquia district.

The master plan outlined in the competition brief covers 125 residential apartments for low income families. Around 4,000 dwellings were planned for the 333,000 m2 site that has been divided into 21 sub-areas. The site's soil conditions are poor, consisting of soft, silty clay overlying fine to medium sands. The low bearing capacity of the soil means that, for traditional (heavy) construction, deep or piled foundations would make multi-storey buildings prohibitively expensive for low income housing. Consequently, an important part of this location's demonstration is to show the benefits of lightweight steel construction for building on such a challenging site.