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URBAN CONDUCTIVITY Location: Thessaloniki, Greece
Plot size: 3200 m2 Project year: 2013 Architectural Competition Entry Honorable mention Team Architects: Naya Stergiou, Thomas Dalampouras |
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The competition area is located in Ano Poli (Upper City) of the municipality of Thessaloniki. The present condition of the settlement, which still maintains a level of traditional status, is an evolution of the Muslim neighborhoods, the Christian neighborhood of Vlatades and the newer builds around the Byzantine churches and the mosques. It consists of a number of conflicting and contradicting elements that merge to create the transitional zone between the highly urbanized areas of centre of Thessaloniki and the amorphous and anarchic expansion areas outside the historic city’s walls. Pattern-less networks of narrow streets of non-specific width characterize the plan of the area. It is mainly a housing area, thus having a strong neighborhood character. Like the whole Ano Poli area, the space suffers from an almost total lack of public open spaces. Common public spaces are dormant fractions of the urban tissue as they are in fact residual spaces along either side of the crossing street. They remain unused and unformed, unable to correspond to their primary role as functional public urban spaces.
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Contradicting the very essence and history of traditional settlements – including Ano Poli – where public open spaces are the backbone of everyday urban life.
Along this organic, un-planned and un-programmed urbanscape, this proposal aims to re- insert functions and structures that in the past have formed and established the distinct character of the settlement. These elements, both specific and abstract, are redefined to adapt to the contemporary facts, figures and needs of the inhabitants and the visitors in order to have a successful connection with the past, the area’s collective memory and upgrade the quality of life in an area that is lacking basic infrastructure and organization. Alongside these elements, this proposal regulates circulation and grants priority to the pedestrians, forbidding vehicle passage in certain subsectors with a goal to maximize public space surface. |
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The proposal consists of a series of point interventions scattered on key locations for reasons of cost efficiency and above all, for adaptability to the settlement’s character since in traditional settlements the key elements of public life had a singular spot aspect.
The design integrity between these spot interventions is achieved through an overall urban concept approach, where each proposed feature has a unique function and at the same time they complement one another. The common design vocabulary, with flexibility as its main ingredient makes it easy to adapt to the differentiating topography and the proposed function of each localized subsector. This vocabulary derives from definitions that described the settlement in cellular level. Specific meanings as the “glade” (randomly resulting open space geometry, commonly at the end of a street), |
the “square with the great plane tree and the mantel” (redesigned as a wooden plateau around the existing tree of Tsitsani square), the “belvedere“ (formed as a look out facing the sea view), the “fountain” (water columns with bioclimatic function), the “cobbled road -chair on the street concept” (seat rows reclaiming the public space) are introduced; some more abstract ideas are related to form, structure or geometry as the “embroidery” (new flooring out of paver stones and grass forming geometric patterns), the “cube” (elemental geometry form for the design of the whole area) and the “tsatmas” (traditional wall construction method redefined as the design method of the covered seats - bus terminals).
A layer of plantation in abundance is added on top of this scenery of point interventions so as to augment the environmental conditions and upgrade the optical experience of the urban user. |
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