Jurmala is located on a long and narrow strip of land that stretches for 30 kilometers between the sea and the Lielupe River. The river flows from the continent towards the sea, but having not reached the beaches for some reason, it turns sharply to the east and goes further along the coast. Then one of its arms flows into the mouth of the Daugava, and the other into the sea. This unusual piece of land is built up with low, in some places dacha quarters interspersed with fragments of forest and floodplain meadows - in a word, a resort place, quiet, flat, although not without industrial inclusions. True, small and harmless.
One of these inclusions is located in the easternmost part of the Jurmala "peninsula" - several vast warehouse-type hangars are crowded on the left bank of the river before it flows into the sea. The natural surroundings are completely idyllic: forest, water, islands. On the contrary, across the river - the so-called “white dune” (Baltā Kāpa), a large sandy cape overgrown with thin pines, which is protected as a natural monument of national importance. And in the midst of these northern beauties suddenly - some sheds made of silicate bricks. It is quite logical to use such a place for a resort village.
This is what Guntis Ravis, the owner of the largest Latvian construction company "Skonto buve", and his partners did. They decided to build a village here with a yacht club and a hotel, and in the spring of this year they held a competition for the best variant of planning and development of the territory. The competition was named Balta Kapa after the mentioned natural monument. At the end of May, it was announced that the winner of the competition was a project developed by a team of young architects (Anton Yegerev, Anastasia Ivanova, Azat Khasanov) under the leadership of Sergei Kiselev.
The project is called ‘fingerscape’ and it’s easy to guess that there is no exact translation of this word into Russian. This is a play on words, both Latvian and English. Cape - in English "cape". At the same time, this word is consonant with the Latvian kapa - "dune", and, consequently, the name of the local landmark, the name of the competition (and the future village?) - Baltā Kāpa. It turns out that if on the right bank of the river - Baltā Kāpa, then on the left - the architects invented its reflection, fingers-Cape. Finally, this word is similar to landscape - a landscape in which the first word 'land', earth, is replaced by 'fingers', 'fingers'. But what do the fingers have to do with it?
In the project of Sergey Kiselev's team, "fingers" are artificial landscape elements that the architects plan to create from construction waste from destroyed warehouse buildings. Piles of construction waste will not have to be taken anywhere, and besides, they will be useful. They should unobtrusively divide the territory into plots, serving partly as fences and providing a proper measure of intimacy for each house. But, on the other hand, they will protect residents from the wind, which is important on the flat Baltic coast. So the invention looks quite practical, inexpensive (even economical) and convenient.
The artificial elements of the landscape will be a bit like dunes - long irregularly shaped hills stretched perpendicular to the river bank. I must say that completely real sand dunes begin to the southeast of the village, and their artificial semblance, one might say, continues this landscape. However, the authors are very cautious about the noted similarity with the dunes, stubbornly calling their structures “fingers”, or ramparts, probably out of unwillingness to argue about the accuracy of repetition of the natural form. It really is more like a semblance, a hint on the topic, than a copy. In addition, according to the architects' conviction, from the point of view of landscape terminology, a dune is a special case of a rampart, an extended embankment.
And if we continue to reason in the same spirit, we can recall that not only amber is found on the shores of the Baltic, but also the so-called "devil's fingers" - elongated pieces of stone, the remains of prehistoric belemnites. It may so happen that it’s not dunes at all, but some mythical creature that grabbed the river bank with its “fingers” … However, this, of course, is a metaphor. But something else is important: the project is literary. In addition to the intriguing title, this is supported not only by a clear and beautiful description of the idea in two languages (Latvian and English), but also essays in the light genre of essays, placed in the booklet. Short stories illustrate the life of the future inhabitants of the village: from successful lonely managers who adore yachting, and ending with respectable retirees, whose children, visiting their parents, stay in a hotel designed for such occasions. In a word, the architecture of the buildings is in the draft stage (the authors deliberately limited themselves to the "code", that is, several restrictions, leaving houses at the discretion of future owners). But the image of the project is worked out and decorated to the smallest detail.
Another feature of the project that immediately catches the eye is that it has a downright supernatural combination of such noble and modern qualities as delicacy and environmental friendliness. Architecture appears in him as some kind of even disappearing, or rather carefully hidden, element. There is not much of it and it is not visible, even more of the landscape. So it was in the garden ventures of the 18th century - the master worked a lot, and all so that his works were not visible, and the audience thought that the beauty around them was natural. Here the topic is fully disclosed: broken lines, buildings are hidden between the hills and themselves are a bit like hills.
Apparently, the competition task itself, due to the position of the customer, adds a lot to this delicacy. Think about it - 16 houses will be built on 16 hectares. It's scary to say how many useful meters would be squeezed out of such an area in the Moscow region. The largest public building is a hotel, with a total of just over 1000 sq. meters - I remember that in Pirogov, each super-villa was conceived with an area twice as large.
The fact that the project is focused on nature and ecology is obvious. What is at least a scrupulous count of trees - how much was, how much is saved, how much is planned to be planted. But in this case, the approach to the fashionable topic of ecology has several characteristic features - firstly, it is very restrained, without extremes. After all, how do we imagine an eco-friendly house? Either dug into the ground like a bunker - so that you can't see it at all, or - a giant, planted with greenery on all sides - on the roof, along the walls and inside. And here there are no extremes - the project is just small, and the attitude towards the site is respectful. However, all the participants have it and it is more a feature of the competition than of this project.
The difference between the project of Sergey Kiselev's team is precisely in the fact that they proposed a more radical transformation of the landscape than all the other participants - artificial hills. In two more competitive projects, something similar was present, but “the other way around”: the authors of the LL 134 project laid a new river in the middle of the village, and in the BK 777 project - a chain of artificial ponds (an incentive prize). But, firstly, it is much more expensive than pouring hills from the material at hand; and secondly, there are more than enough different waters, rivers and rivulets around; but protection from water and wind is just not enough.
Incidentally, the 'fingerscape' concept also includes a flood protection dam in the western part of the village. It turns out curious: people imitate the characteristic landscape, take care of, plant trees - but at the same time they protect themselves from the unfavorable manifestations of the nature of Mother Nature. A very correct, in my opinion, approach to ecology: beautiful and pleasant, without extremes.
All these qualities, from a solid idea to a competent presentation, fit into what can be called a European approach to design. Many similar examples could be seen at the Venice Biennale, especially in the Italian pavilion, or, for example, in the maiden's garden behind the Arsenal - there were also a lot of texts and greenery.
But it is not hard to feel that the Europeanism of the 'fingerscape' project is even more emphasized and thorough. I would like to call its authors "Europeans squared" - they seem to be more Catholics than even the Pope. However, on the Riga seaside it probably happens by itself. It is difficult to imagine such a project in the Moscow region - here they either bury themselves in the ground, or rise above the ground, otherwise it will not work.
Competition website www.baltakapa.lv, e-mail [email protected], tel. +371 27857800