URBAN SERIES
a monumental international fair complex goes wild in between financial crises and civil war. nearly six decades later claims the lost time and revives a limited area as a technology and innovation hub, squeezed among the futuristic dream of niemeyer and lebanon.
life will find a way in again and refresh this abandoned monument with aspiration!
cluster v1.0
welcomes tech-innovators from all over the world merged into unfinished monumental international fair
cluster v1.0, located in the heart of tripoli, is the new hub for innovation and technology, transforming ideas into start-ups and growing into empowered businesses, with maximum flexibility of shared, flex, and open offices connected with human-centric open and semi-open interaction areas, which act individually as a part of a big network, creating a riddled ground floor which supports walking through in a climatic comfort zone, enhancing interactivity and physical engagement as well as the health of body and mind. the retail and f&b areas are scattered throughout the narrow streets and squares, increasing the possibility of happy encounters, offering background for various and distinctive environments in every corner.
year
size
location
theme
status
2019
45.000 m2
lebanon
tripoli
urban design
competition
started as a plan to put tripoli on the cultural and economic map, rachid karami international fair complex, could not make it to the end for decades and has recently been added to unesco heritage tentative list for the preservation of its cultural, architectural, and historical value. designed by renowned brazilian architect oscar niemeyer loosely inspired by his early works on futuristic capital, Brasilia. so it is important to take these into consideration.
a simple reaction inspired by the unique urban life of tripoli gave way to the idea of “cluster”. the archeological memory of the old city is epitomized by simple horizontal and planar shifts. the pieces behaving like one in material also mimic the prolific pattern of urban facade topography, turning into one body which also enforces the unity of the whole plan concept. the facades are as simple as possible in material and shape not to compete with the existing and fair structures and give each other their space.
how can we approach a possible UNESCO heritage site in a city divided between the old and the new, the traditional and the modern, the density and the open, the monumental and the cultural,
the scale and the whole?
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the earthly boxes, seemingly elevate along the monumental lines of this unesco heritage modern architecture, constitute a human-centric comfort zone in scale, climate, interaction... generating both physical and virtual networks of life.
as the existing horizontal building features as a transparent sculpture of vertical lines, the new ones hold onto it as a point of origin, connecting all the dots along the way, respecting each possibility of interaction
The scattered masses emerge pixelated from the earth inspired by the lively serpentine mazes of the old city that promotes the pattern of old tripoli
in the pursue of a human-scale cluster scattered with smooth transition between the monumental and colossal heritage site and the city, stimulated by the serpentine pathways of the old city, simulating a pattern of life, echoing the city’s archeological memory for dense, vibrant, and cool interaction.
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