2025 PLEČNIK MEDAL for Small-Scale Architectural Realisation

Revitalisation of Stara steklarska and Vrazov Square

Architecture:
Matevž Zalar
Ambrož Bartol
Dominik Košak
Miha Munda
Rok Staudacher
Samo Kralj

Landscape architecture:
Darja Matjašec
Pia Kante
Katja Mali

Data:

Revitalisation of Stara steklarska and Vrazov Square with adjoining streets in Ptuj historic city core

Category: Small-Scale Architectural Realisation

Authors: Matevž Zalar, Ambrož Bartol, Dominik Košak, Miha Munda, Rok Staudacher, Samo Kralj (architecture) and Darja Matjašec, Pia Kante, Katja Mali (landscape architecture)

Collaborators: Marko Primažič

Location: 1 Tomaža Šalamuna Street, Ptuj

Year of realisation: 2023

Gross area: 1,361 sqm (building), 3,181 sqm (grounds)

Investor: City Municipality of Ptuj

Photographs:
Miran Kambič

PLEČNIK MEDAL in the category of small-scale architectural realisation

The revitalisation of the buildings comprising Stara steklarska ("Old Glassworks") and the exterior ambients connects the substantive and material historical layers of the city of Ptuj with contemporary public programmes for community activation and the revitalisation of the historic city core. The area in question includes the streets servicing Vrazov Square, the courtyard of Stara steklarska, and the new house of amateur culture including a youth centre. The interventions in the form of small-scale urban equipment function "acupuncturally" as it is chiefly the large scale of the city that accentuates the experience. Well considered fragments respond to the specificities of the individual open-air and interior situations whereby new spatial connections afford an opportunity for a rich sensation of experience.

Revitalisation of Stara steklarska and Vrazov Square - Jury's report

The revitalisation of the buildings comprising Stara steklarska ("Old Glassworks") and the exterior ambients connects the substantive and material historical layers of the city of Ptuj with contemporary public programmes for community activation and the revitalisation of the historic city core. The area in question includes the streets servicing Vrazov Square, the courtyard of Stara steklarska, and the new house of amateur culture including a youth centre. The interventions in the form of small-scale urban equipment function "acupuncturally" as it is chiefly the large scale of the city that accentuates the experience. Well considered fragments respond to the specificities of the individual open-air and interior situations whereby new spatial connections afford an opportunity for a rich sensation of experience.

The Centre Stara steklarska is slightly withdrawn from the hub of the cultural activity in Vrazov Square but it does affiliate with it. The renovation of the buildings which were to become the new house of amateur culture was executed in accommodation of their former outlines with only a part of the building having been removed, along with a wall separating the courtyard and the street. The new wall is slightly shorter yet continues to preserve the ambient of the Mediaeval city core. The exposed concrete's profiled structure creates a texture adapted to the small scale of the site while a sliding door has been fitted to the wall so as to enable the courtyard to be separated from the street yet emphasise the courtyard's accessibility when open. The gable-roofed volume peeking over the wall and overlooking the alley subtly draws attention to the venue's presence.

There are two event halls opening onto the courtyard; the audience is also afforded a view of anything taking place on the larger hall's stage from the exterior mini-auditorium. The maximum flexibility of the event spaces is enabled by the adaptability of the stage platforms in the large hall, which otherwise exhibits a single-level design. The smaller hall functions as an intermediary space between the exterior and the third hall. The latter's being of an older date - something corroborated also by the character of its ambient - supplies a visual continuation of the space of the courtyard into the interior. In this context, the particular sensibility of the authors for the materiality of the existing space and the innovative interpretation thereof deserves a special mention as an upgrade of the architectural experience in terms of its meaning has been achieved. In the hall, the boundary between the new and old floorboards is further echoed on the wall and defines the border between the various treatments of the renovation's texture; in the stairwell, the impression of the old steps waits to be discovered; on the upper floor, a view opens onto the church steeple; elsewhere, an old wall trades glances with the staircase. There is an abundance of such fragments yet they do not cause the experience of the space to be oversaturated but rather layered and enriched.

The project whose entirety cannot be truly grasped from any single point in the city builds its architectural articulation in a fragmented way, by means of colour, materials, and a considered gradation of the scale so as to establish a dialogue with the existing fabric of the wider city space. The same is true of the house of culture, its building re-examining the existing elements in latter-day materials while at the same time creating user-friendly atmospheres. A clear design featuring a dialogue between the old and the new, as well as its initiation of a dialogue with the city, is the principal theme running through the entire renovation.

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