Graz

WINNER - JB007 – EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE & ENERGY PARK GRAZ

Andreas Lechner (AT), Emilio Hauer, (AT), Robert Zawodnik (AT), architects
Contributor: Christoph Simschitz (AT)

The project introduces a clear and strong strategy of evaluating the area as a
promising future, a new model for peripheral areas which suffer from an overall lack of structural qualities, are characterized by a diffused landscape and an absolute absence of identity. The idea is to develop a characeristic new spatial setting which we could see as a „productive landscape“ entering a specific dialogue with buildings:
being a significant, large-scaled object each building provides a specific programme which is strongly linked to the productive landscape, using and shaping its qualities.
At the same time these specific buildings share the same skin, thus introducing a
serial mode of sequential appearances along the longitudinal development of the
landscape: the heterogeneity of the area meets the homeogeneity of the skin,
provoking an attractive tension between similarity and difference. The Mur river as
the one identifying element thus finds its correspondence in the overall study area
which – territorially – develops to a new species, an interesting pilot-model for
suburban areas where landscape closely intertwines with large scale production,
integrating agricultural, industrial, an recreational uses. Although the large scale of
the project does not seem to respect the context of the fragmented ownership
structures, the strategy clearly addresses the pattern of the parcels creating
different „fields“ of intervention in which the specific programmatic scenarios can
take place.
The suggested programs range from agricultural animal farms to recreational drive- in buildings. The jury discusses the apropriateness of size and programme in relation to the demands of an intelligent urban strategy. Parts of the jury do not see any viable strategy behind the seductive images which tell about the poetic relationship between landscape and object. Another part of the jury exactly sees in the configuration of large scale developments in synergy with an open landscape a very high strategic potential: by providing a concept for a very strong identity, issues such as traffic infrastructure, interdisciplinary synergies, programmatical appropriateness and landscape development are secondary structures whose
further development can be easily negotiated and adapted in the future process
without loosing the quality of the concept.

(Excerpt from jury report)

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