We are talking about a "new urban center" on Chulenov Street: a 4-hectare site within the former industrial zone, which is now being reconstructed. It is located close to the old town and from the banks of the Danube. The task of the competition was a project of residential and office buildings, supplemented by shops and cafes. The cultural component of the program should be the historical building of the CHP, located in the middle of the site.
According to the authorities, who assigned it the status of a monument, the power plant could be turned into the National Gallery of Modern Industrial Design, Fine Arts and Architecture.
Zaha Hadid took the first place in the competition. Its plan is a "dynamic field" of rounded and elliptical elements flowing into each other. Chief among them are seven office and residential towers. This decision made it possible to free the rest of the site for public needs and landscaping.
A "plaza of culture" will appear next to the CHPP, and a two-storey underground garage occupying a significant part of the territory will be closed on top by a public space floor with openings in the ceilings forming a "patio" illuminated by the sun. Along the perimeter of the site, this "layer" will be either raised and strengthened, indicating the entrances to the garage, office and residential areas, or, on the contrary, softened, thereby blurring the border between the new area and the adjacent territories.
The finalists of the Notelings Reidijk competition proposed an alternative solution in the form of a rigid rectangular plan grid with spacious green space in the center of the plot and perimeter buildings.
As conceived by Domenique Perrault, four buildings with courtyards will be enough to accommodate all functional areas.
BRT has developed a variant, already familiar to these architects, with cantilever stems that complete the towers.
The Vaíllo & Irigaray workshop took the path of merging the new area with the surrounding buildings: a single multi-part building should "pull" the adjacent quarters into its sphere of influence.
In addition to these bureaus, FOA, gmp, JDS and Cigler Marani Architects entered the final of the competition.
![EQUITONE [natura] Panels In Contrasting Colors Create The Dynamic Facade Of The New RWTH Aachen University Building And Successfully Resist Graffiti Lovers](https://i.architectureprof.com/images/004/image-10041-j.webp "EQUITONE [natura] Panels In Contrasting Colors Create The Dynamic Facade Of The New RWTH Aachen University Building And Successfully Resist Graffiti Lovers")
