Emerging architecture

Architectural Review, The, Dec, 2002 by Peter Davey

Civic

The memorial pedestrian bridge at Rijeka in Croatia by 3LHD (p45) won an award as much (or perhaps more) for its contribution to the spatial sequences of the city as its ingenuity in engineering design. Similarly, the pedestrian bridge at Gateshead by Wilkinson Eyre (p58) makes an important contribution to the city, both practically and in its reinterpretation of a proud engineering tradition. Another distinguished addition to urban infrastructure is made by the Copenhagen metro stations by KHRAS (p70); they are models of clarity and ingenuity in the way they bring daylight deep underground.

If metros help preserve urbanity, cars destroy it. We welcomed Ingenhoven Overdiek & Partner's elegant reworking of that normally drear building type, the muti-storey car park, in Offenburg (p56). In a different way, Andrej Kalamar has attempted to mitigate the worst effects of traffic with his little corner building in Ljubljana (p76).

The two commended projects from Spain, the congress centre in Murcia by Paredes Pedrosa (p74), and the swimming pool at Pontedeume by Quintans, Raya, Crespo (p68) are both fundamentally urban buildings that serve the community. Both clearly respond to the cityscape, and to climate, and are thoughtful responses to social programme. Equally orientated to urban community is the brave and innovative women's centre at Rufisque, Senegal by Hollmen Reuter Sandman (p82). So, in a sense, is the clinic and pharmacy by Tatsuo Kawanishi, which makes a social and urban contribution to a very delicate part of Kyoto (p72).

Both the commended religious buildings: the church near Oslo, Norway by Jensen & Skodvin (p52) and the chapel at Bogota, Colombia (p78) by Daniel Bonilla are buildings for communities, but are set in much more natural landscapes on which they reflect in very different and moving ways. Equally, Jou Min Lin's schools at Min Ho in Taiwan (p64) respond to the marvellous tropical landscape, while providing different kinds of space appropriate for communities of small children and teenagers.

Specific

You could describe Niall McLaughlin's bandstand at Bexhill (p77) as a construction for the community; certainly, all members of the jury were enthused by the architect's jolly vision of tea dancing on the seafront. But it could also be regarded as a very large piece of furniture, like the fruit-store in Chile by Felipe Assadi (p87), which shows how a normally dull and neglected kind of structure can economically be made both elegant and efficient.

Another large piece of furniture is the award-winning temporary Stylepark lounge for the UIA congress in Berlin this year by Jurgen Mayer H. (p50). Made of modular, reassemblable elements, the interior-scape combines ergonomic principles with tectonic sensitivity. Equally transformatory of interior space, and even more transient is the installation by Hampson, Foley, Thompson and di Mauro (p73), which greatly impressed us with its ingenious understanding of material properties and how they can be exploited simply in an entirely new way. Another inventive use of simple elements is the adjustable light by Edge (p86), which the jury felt had much potential for development. Needing no further refinement is the exquisite teapot by Forsythe MacAllen (p83), which shows such understanding of materials and human relation to them that it is sure to become a classic. So we had a cathedral (well, a very fine church) and a bicycle shed (the fruit store), a cemetery and a tea-pot, a car park and a garden full of parasols, a metro system and a tree house. We only wish that we could have celebrated more of the marvellous range of entries. (4)