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Salt Lake City

The client asked for a proposal for a mixed development including housing, offices, retail and public uses in a site between the bay of Larnaca and the salt lake of the city. The main intention of our proposal was the creation of a small city of neighbourhoods structured around gardens in big or medium scale and incorporating small gardens in housing units. For that we gave emphasis to the empty space. We considered voids between buildings in various sizes as opportunities for nature to take over and colonise them. In our project we highlighted the importance of open-air and semi open-air common, shared and privates spaces for the residents and users and we stress their important role in defining the quality of living space.

For that we proposed a polycentric urban structure that consists of 3 big-scale centres. These connect the site with the rest of the city and each one reserves a different public character. The gardens are the constituting element of urban structure. They are private or shared spaces that contain nature and which refer to various scales of use:  Patios shared between houses or among cluster of housing units, neighbourhood gardens shared among 10-15 housing units, small plazas in quarters (20-30 units) with mixed uses (housing, retail, recreation), plazas destined for use by the whole site.

We propose the creation of clusters with mix of uses such as retail, offices and mainly housing are structured around clusters of 2-5 housing units, and neighbourhoods of 10-15 units. Each cluster or neighbourhood is structure around one or more shared common spaces and facilities. The aim is the creation of the sense of neighbourhood, distinct identity and micro-climate or micro-social conditions.

We propose a grid consisting of orthogonal units that is directed along the East-West axis as an organising tool. The grid offers flexibility and allows various configurations of volumes and the creation of various combinations of bigger or smaller clusters. The grid creates a chessboard of volumes and voids and exposes the large side of each unit towards the south orientation. The west-east direction of the grid allows the coastal air, and the West and Northwest breeze to pass through the site during the summer and allows the natural ventilation of the site.

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PROJECT: Salt Lake City, Shortlisted in invited competition

CLIENT: QN DEVELOPING Company

PLACE/TIME: Larnace, Cyprus, 2017

BUDGET : 40,000,000 E

DESIGN TEAM: Christiana Ioannou, Christos Papastergiou

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Master Plan

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Sections

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Housing Typology

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Large Public spaces

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Neighborhood Gardens

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Sunset and Sunrise

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