Villa Rustica, located in Blankenheim, 2 thousand years ago, was a rich estate built on a hillside. Its buildings were erected on terraces according to an axial plan: this is the only example of such a composition in the territory of North Rhine-Westphalia. The villa was found at the end of the 19th century, but then its remains were mothballed to be rediscovered after more than 100 years. Now it is planned to turn the complex into a museum: the walls of the main house with a monumental portico, mosaics and marble cladding, and the ruins of other buildings of the estate are well preserved.
Initially, it was supposed to partially reconstruct the monument, but later this idea was abandoned, and it was on this principle that the winner of the competition was chosen: the workshop "Schneider + Schumacher" and the landscape architects GTL Gnüchtel Triebswetter did not use any references to history in their project. On the contrary, the "honesty and clarity" of their proposal highlights the original monument, organizing the space around it. The museum will play a major role in the free space surrounding it, which is united by axial and diagonal paths for viewing. The portico of the main house is placed in a "showcase" of glass and steel, which protects it from bad weather, turning it into a kind of "scene" on the ridge of the hill, which closes the composition. The ruins of six outbuildings attached to it on both sides, located behind it, are placed under sheds; they are treated as traversable platforms. The jury also noted the prospect of the "aging" of the complex taken into account by the architects, as well as its modest budget.
