TENSE ARCHITECTURE NETWORK_REFORMATION OF NEAPOLI SEA FRONT_COMPETITION/DISTINCTION

The proposal aims to a revival of the relation between the city and the sea, by intervening at their in-between critical limit. The character of the primordial section of the old city sea-front, which possessed an inherent simplicity -and where just the beach’s sloping plane achieved their mutual, natural contact- is restored: The sea-front land zone is reformed and gets reconnected to the beach and the sea -operating as a receptive, stone, linear urban landscape. Neapoli is a city that spreads in an almost 2 km length, while the distance between the building front and the water remains relatively steady. Additionally, its central pier- symmetrically placed and perpendicular to the building’s front– necessarily obtains in the proposal a sculptural appeal –now standing as a landmark. The proposed intervention follows the already strong presence of the current urban linearity, it is born by it. Parallel to the buildings, parallel to the seaside, vertically to the central pier, a linear sequence of stone carvings, dominates: It is the new intermediate topos. Its ground is being shaped by a sequence of linear levels which attempt to reclaim the relation between the city and the sea, rescind the presence of the steep embankment fill and operate as flexible receptors of social life. The width of the sea-front land zone, which derives from the central sector and the pier, is progressively reduced towards the city’s edges: on one hand the intensive functional character of the central sector defines its amplitude and on the other hand the reduction of the stone surfaces towards the edges attempts to restore the width of the beach, especially to the east. The new linear tree alley that supplements the central sector’s existing planting, leads at the extremities in two different substantial green areas, of a diverse nature, two new urban groves -at the entrance and the exit of the city respectively.

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