SKWER SPORTÓW MIEJSKICH
YEAR 2010 ClIENT POLSKA MŁODYCH LOCATION WARSZAWA, PL PROGRAM PUBLIC SPACE, HEALTH, SPORTS AREA 4200 M2 STATUS CONCEPT TEAM BUDCUD, CENTRALA, DSK, FORUM ROZWOJU WARSZAWY, GRZEGORZ GĄDEK (initiator), INFO MAGAZINE, KAPS, MOKO, WWAA
Skwer is a powerful idea put into the form of architectural project. A simple response to existing situation – total lack of urban sports friendly places in Warsaw, combined with a skyrocketing demand for such space in the city – became a statement project of Polish young generation’s architects and many other parties. We are willing to create a quality public space for every generation of urban sportsmen. We are strongly convinced, that the space shall serve the citizens for sportsmanship, cultural and integration purposes and be planned within a framework of open discussion and collaborative development process. The idea of the Skwer is “a space for every generation of sportsmen”. Placing an idea of urban sports into analysis, we might observe a few important divisions. With modern sports like skateboarding, parkour, bouldering or breakdance being hugely popular among youth, we also distinguish and honor the needs of “classical” urban sports discipline enthusiast like chess, boule, dance, table tennis and many more, thus promoting fitness among the elderly and the cross-generation interaction, both crucial in the light of European demographics and both very specific for Warsaw central districts, which for historical reasons are widely populated by currently retired citizens. Further facts important to consider within a process are possible to observe within a process of conducting sports activities, especially visible in acrobatic sports such as parkour and skateboarding. When starting a routine training, a person is willing to warm-up, and then moving to specific sets of progressively difficult obstacles. Tricks conducted on the most characteristic, difficult and iconic obstacles are recorded as a video, or photographic footage collected to take place in ever growing archives of extreme sports full-length videos and internet movie clips. Being deeply conscious of the place in the urban sport’s history of such places like Philadelphia Love Park, Prague “Stalin” skate spot, or Barcelona’s Macba, we are aware of the necessity to create a space, which might attract Polish and international professional athletes to visit the venue, thus creating another important need: auditorium. Meeting the need of presenting one’s skills on one hand and the curiosity of the spectators on the other, for Zielna site we have created an idea of “inverted stadium”, where the auditorium is in the middle, contrary to traditional “arena” shaped stadium with the sportsmen gathered in the middle and surrounded by the stands. We believe this shape transmits the idea of urban sports better, as they tend to be connected with the city and best likely to be conducted within a natural – city – environment. Moreover, throughout the process of analysis, socializing became identified as an important element of the routine – collectively conducting sports and spending time on the spots are equally important for the athletes. Thus the “inverted stadium” form seems to be a rational choice, creating a modern urban lawn for spending time collectively, recreational sports space like frisbee and finally, a fit place for spectators and a valuable offer for neighboring office space workers to visit throughout lunch break, or post-work spare time. Located on the junction of two subway lines, might become a gathering place for people willing to meet somewhere downtown in order to move elsewhere. As we pointed out, urban sports are closely connected to visual arts and much of the documentation is taken in the form of video. Therefore we have included the idea of outdoors cinema, which would allow promoting the urban sports and other topic movies, creating yet another social use layer for the concept.