Introduction. The urban history of Zagreb – a crossroads, border city and capital is built upon the alternation between transitory configuration and permanent configuration. The historical, political and economic alternations have shaped the urban structure and each new modernization process in the city has produced its own specific area and designated it as a new polarity. In the last decade Zagreb has been in search of a new face: a dynamic and active cultural climate acts as the backdrop to a series of actions that involve administrators, institutions and specialized workers in an attempt to identify effective urban strategies for the management and growth of the city. In this context, transforming Badel Block means addressing the many expectations placed on the future of an urban void in search of a new definition and rich in potential to be unveiled.
© Emanuele Marcotullio . Published on February 26, 2014.
The project themes. The most consolidated part of the urban fabric of Zagreb in the areas bordering Badel Block bears the mark of the scansion of the territory caused by the distinct narrow and elongated shape of the typical lot of a medieval city. The project proposal seeks comparison with this urban dimension and reinterprets it in a succession of parallel strips, the dimensions of which relate directly to the subdivision of the building curtain wall of Vlaška Street, with its solids and voids. The void within Badel Block, linked to area’s most recent history and its characteristics as a production area, is in equal measure a central source of inspiration for the project which gives the void itself the critical role of a public space and therefore of a connective element, both within the area and between the area and the urban surroundings with which it relates.
© Emanuele Marcotullio . Published on February 26, 2014.
The project matrix and its formalization on an urban scale. The series of strips is the matrix that makes it possible to carry out a homogeneous intervention on Badel Block. In its constant role as an element that redesigns the lie of the ground, the strip takes on different configurations: where it becomes a landscape fragment, it identifiesthe areas pertaining to urban greenery, namely the areas where plants will be prevalent; where it becomes a spatial device, it takes on the concrete nature of matter and the three-dimensional form of a band that together form a series of sections, or profiles, which take shape in relation to the themes it aims to resolve. Thus the band has a different configuration each time. In some situations its level is so low it meets the ground seeking dialogue with the urban surroundings, elsewhere it meets the pre-existing buildings and relates to them in a variety of ways, and in other cases it becomes three-dimensional and identifies appurtenant spaces for new buildings. In this latter case it becomes the predominant element that defines the new façade of Badel Block on Marticeva Street. With its variety of configurations, the band is the element that most defines the hierarchies between the solids and the voids and that reveals, on the street façade, the trace system that organizes the space within the project area.
© Emanuele Marcotullio . Published on February 26, 2014.
The architecture and its functional characteristics. Where the spatial device of the band acquires a three-dimensional form it identifies a frame within which the architecture is organized without being bound by pre-defined forms, but rather by following an independent compositional logic. The Plug-in boxes are modular elements responsible for the organization of the functional programme; they permit the flexible distribution of the facilities (businesses, offices, residences, public services in general) and for them to be altered and changed over time. Without forgetting the importance of allocating the most accessible spaces to public and commercial activities and carving out a more secluded position for the residences, the proposed configuration for the distribution of the facilities favours the criteria of necessary mixing, to increase the opportunities for using the void within the area. The pre-existing buildings that must not be destroyed represent a privileged place to be used for public activities, and their integration in the project is resolved through the relationship established between them and the band. The latter interfaces with the yeast production factory building through a moderate relationship marked by proximity and adjacency; whereas the approach to the spirits refinery and distillery is more complex, which is skirted and overhung in two points and more deeply encroached on in a third, where the building and the band interlace and end up sharing volumes and spaces.
© Emanuele Marcotullio . Published on February 26, 2014.
The void as an Urban Connector. The strip’s point of arrival on the outside and the intrusion of the public space within the block contribute to the creation of a system of integrated spaces revealing the logic that guides the project. The role of Urban Connector predominantly entrusted to the side that can be penetrated on Šubiceva Street, is not contradicted on the other margins of the area. Thus the entire perimeter of the block participates in the general idea of ensuring the continuity of the paths and increasing the possibility of movement from the inside to the outside of the area and vice versa, and from ground level to the basement level of the car park, where the pertinent areas do not remain isolated but conversely become part of the same system. The void, never monotonous due to the variation in alternating ground levels and the proliferation of possible pathways, has no interruptions and establishes an intense dialogue between the project area and its surroundings.
© Emanuele Marcotullio . Published on February 26, 2014.
The hypothesis for Badel Block: between permanent trace and transitory elements. The Badel Block project centres around the definition of a clear structure (matrix) that acts as a backdrop that assumes different characteristics (landscape fragment, spatial device) and in doing so arranges the space where the variable elements (plug-in boxes), responsible for the organization of the facilities, are installed. The coexistence of permanent traces and transitory elements – the expression of an open work – introduces dynamics into the area that guide the processes of urban growth and stratification and responds to it with logical ordering on the basis of which the area inside the block can then alter and change over time in a flexible manner. BADEL [S]TRIPS takes this condition as a central idea for the development of the area and elevates it to an improvement strategy so that Badel Block can recover an important role in the general process of urban growth and redevelopment and become a vehicle and mirror for relationships that fuel and give life to the city.