47Nord15Ost

Graz (AT) - Winner

TEAM DATA

Team Representative: Luigi Costamagna (IT) – architect; Associate: Celia Cardona Cava (ES) – architect
Contributors: Gabriele Cagini (IT) – economist; Paula Camila Godoy Gutierrez (CO) – interior designer; Alessandro Talò (IT) – architect; Lorenzo Giampietro (IT) – archaeologist

winwinoffice
Corso Buenos Aires 66, 20124 Milano (IT)
winwinoffice.eu@gmail.com – www.winwinoffice.eu

See the complete listing of portraits here
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P. Godoy Gutiérrez, A. Talò, C. Cardona Cava, G. Cagini, L. Costamagna and L. Giampietro


VIDEO (by the team)


INTERVIEW

1. How did you form the team for the competition?

In our Mediterranean culture, family and friends are the most important things in life. So, we decided to start this adventure with them. The team has not only been formed based on each individual’s skills, but also on the trust and spontaneity between us.

2. How do you define the main issue of your project, and how did you answer on this session main topic: the place of productive activities within the city?

There is not only one main issue but three, which are interlinked. First: production in a circular economy scenario; Second: participatory design; Third: ecological issues. The site needed a rethinking of the traditional productive strategy, that we translated into a transition from horizontal to vertical factories, followed by the establishment of synergies between existing and future enterprises within the circular economy scenario. This densification is related to the need for urban life inside the industrial area, in order to become an active part of the city. In our opinion, a specific urban project for the future of the area is a utopia. Therefore, we decided to create a guided process made by constants and evolutive rules. This process could lead to a fair result if all the actors are involved.

 

3. How did this issue and the questions raised by the site mutation meet?

Despite the industrial site of Puchstrasse is seen as an alien by the city, in some corners we perceived timid urban life. Thereafter, we understood this as a call to shape it as a part of the city where production and public life could coexist.
This simultaneousness can be achieved with specific interventions that improve the safety and accessibility. These actions are: the reactivation of the Mühlgang channel and the Mur river waterfront; the connection between the Jakomini and Triester Strasse districts; the conversion of Puchstrasse into an urban promenade increasing the pedestrian and cycling space; and the transformation of the logistics system.
At the same time, resilient rules are established, that can bend to the needs of the stakeholders, and actively respond to any economic, social, political and climate variation. These rules provide guidelines about building construction, cooperative services, use of the soil that have to be negotiated by all the actors involved in the process.

 

4. Have you treated this issue previously? What were the reference projects that inspired yours?

It is the first time we have treated the productive city as the main theme. We consider our Europan project not just as an architecture and urban planning project, but also an ideological answer, a different way to approach urban planning. However, we have previously made ideological statements to answer other competition briefs we participated in.
We are fascinated by the “building as a machine” archetype and its quasi-infinite possibilities of reorganization and reinterpretation, both in space and in use. In fact, our building project lays out a flexible and open grid for present and future productive enterprises, adaptable in time.
The respect of the porosity of soil is the way we chose to turn the densification into a sustainable option. As the House in Lège-Cap Ferret (FR) by Lacaton & Vassal, our prototype is built suspended from the ground, aiming to give free space for people and nature.

 

5. Urban-architectural projects like the ones in Europan can only be implemented together with the actors through a negotiated process and in time. How did you consider this issue in your project?

We consider this participative process involving all the actors (from developers and city government to the actual residents and future users of the area) as a crucial element to obtain a better quality of the urban public space, and what’s more, a city shaped for its inhabitants and not the other way.
Living in the city, we realized that some dynamics on the traditional development processes do not meet the answers to the issues questioned by the daily users and citizens. That’s why the project highlights this need for participation and involvement.

6. Is it the first time you have been awarded a prize at Europan? How could this help you in your professional career?

Yes, it is the first time we have been rewarded a prize at Europan, and also the first time we have participated in the competition. We did Europan while building our own practice, so it was a shaping process for us in many ways. The recognition given to our project reaffirms our ideas about the future of the cities and gives us the courage to pursue this process and its implementations.

 

TEAM IDENTITY

Office: winwinoffice
Functions: We formed a team of architects and urban designers to to answer the competition requirements; we also integrated an economist in the team, because it was a main issue of our area and helped us to see from another point of view and to find the right solutions to the existing problems and lacks.
Average age of the associates: 30 years old

Has your team, together or separately, already conceived or implemented some projects and/or won any competition? If yes, which ones?

It is the first competition we have won together and we hope it takes a positive direction towards implementation phase.
Individually, Luigi Costamagna took part in the team that worked and won urban planning competitions during the time he was working with Privileggio-Secchi Architettura (Belgorod City Centre Competition 2013 and MEP Secteur Chandolan Corberaye Chassotte 2013) and Celia Cardona Cava had the chance to work on medium scale urban design projects from the concept to the building phase during the years she spent working with OASI architects (Castronno Main square, completed in 2018 and Kaliningrad Waterfront urban regeneration, study commissioned by Strelka KB, 2018).
Luigi and Celia, since the establishment of winwinoffice in 2017, have been working on different scale projects, from single family villas to big scale urban design competitions.