#17 Sept/Oct 2007

News and observations

• MVRDV's colossal Parkrand apartment building in Geuzenveld, Amsterdam (NL)
• De Architekten Cie. win the competition for the extension of the seat of the Romanian government in Bucharest (RO)
• Update: Sardinia (IT)
• Reality check: Nama's tea pavilion in Putten (NL)
• Matteo Thun builds hotels all over the world. In the Swiss Alps alone, three luxury hotels designed by Thun are under construction.
• and more…

New projects

• L'Escaut and Weinand have designed an 'ice cube' skating rink in Liège (BE)
• BCQ make a brave urban gesture with their design for administrative offices in El Raval, Barcelona (ES)
• In Szczecin, Katowice and Cracow (PL) foreign practices are shaping the landscape
• The competition-winning design for the Vojvodina Museum of Contemporary Art in Novi Sad (CS) by Robert Claiborne, Ivan Markov and Lia Ruccolo preserves industrial structures
• Erick van Egeraat has designed a library in Kazan (RU) as a fully-fledged piece of city

Maruša Zorec: Architecture of discreet change

Maruša Zorec is a busy woman, running her own practice, teaching at Ljubljana University and researching Slovenian architecture from the 1960s and '70s. A10's Maja Vardjan interviews her about her work and her position in Slovenia's contemporary architecture: 'My position? I have never tried to achieve one and I don’t think I have one.'

New buidings

• Looking at Onix's five black 'barn' villas in Zuidhorn (NL), Giampiero Sanguini detects an evolution in their architectural language
• Subarquitectura's tram stops in Alicante (ES) are a worthy city landmark
• Jasarevic Architekten's contemporary mosque contributes to the gradual integration of different beliefs into the village of Penzberg (DE)
• Arhitektuuri Agentuur's villa in Merivalja, Tallinn (EE)
• Will Sadar Vuga's Gradaska apartment building in Ljubljana (SI) manage to overcome its isolated status?
• Goran Rako's covering of a Roman Forum in Vid (HR) brings archaeology alive
• In Hardenberg (NL) Marlies Rohmer designed a futuristic-looking school with a classic structure
• Pott Architects' Haus L in Berlin (DE) is no 'style facade', but an example of undogmatic Modernism
• Manuel Ocaña believes his elderly people's residential complex in Ciutadella, Menorca (ES) 'may become a place we might all want to live in or visit'
• Goczolowie and Ovo Grabczewski combined opacity with transparency in their design for an exhibition pavilion in Krasiejow (PL)

Light & the city

The new relationship between light, architecture and the urban environment goes beyond decoration, advertising and purely functional lighting. New urban lighting is all about the identity of the place, its specific use and sustainability.

Environmentally responsible

The fact that a material is environmentally friendly is in itself no overriding reason for using it. The best materials perform well. If they are also ecologically sound that is an added bonus. A survey of natural and synthetic materials that fulfil both of these requirements.

Focusing on European countries, cities and regions

• Quality and word-of-mouth recommendations are crucial to the success of five young Irish practices. A mini-survey by A10's correspondent Emmet Scanlon
• 23 reasons why Oslo (NO) deserves to be more than a stopover on the way to Norway's natural attractions
• Home: Bence Turányi's flexible apartment, Budapest (HU)

Buildings from the margins of modern history

A reconsideration of Andrija Mutnjakovic's National Library in Pristina, in Kosovo, completed in 1982. Werner Bossmann claims that in post-war Kosovo, where Albanian Kosovars call the shots, the building would have little competition in any race to become the new icon of the nation-in-the-making.