City park Špansko

City park Špansko City generating voronoi

In times of rapid computerization of society, the development of the Internet and communication, the mode of architecture production at the level of ideas and performance is also changing. Nowadays the design files are sent directly from a computer to the machine production. The consequence of this mode is the disappearance of the quest for standardization and turning to variable systems. The unique and the prefabricated now have the same production cost, because the machine does not make a difference in the production of 100 identical or 100 different elements. Repetitive systems are being changed by a series of differentiated elements. Variation is becoming a way of upgrading a project. The question arrises of how to code and generate such diversity.

voronoi diagram

For the project City Park Špansko we used the mathematical system Voronoi as the basis for the code with which to create a variable system. A Voronoi diagram is a specific way of decomposition of a metric surface determined by the distances of objects on that surface. Each point controls the site closest to it. By manipulating the points, we can change the relationship between the sites.

The task of the project in Špansko in Zagreb was to revitalize the park area. The space that we wanted to create was to have both the quality of an urban square and the natural qualities of a park. We imagined this space as a series of programmed sites that create a spatial configuration. By manipulating the points we created a network or a framework for various activities.

programming fields

The resulting network, in which each point represents different content, was programmed by a simple rule, taking into consideration the relationship between urban, natural and recreational areas. With optimal possibilities provided by such organization, the system is constantly changing, expanding and contracting, creating specific micro-ambiances. Software-defined fields equally operate on different levels: on the scale of an urban neighborhood, the scale of a residential building and the individual scale.

City park Špansko

The space between the sites creates an "infrastructure network" – a communication system which generates free and unrestricted use. All sites are at the same height elevation. By simple deformations like rising and lowering of the surface, the network between the sites further defines and supplements their use. Additional common facilities are provided which improve the respective sites, such as a three-way bridge, bus stations, cafes, toilets, grandstands, stairs as well as street lighting and furniture. Minimal intervention creates a space perceived not as two-dimensional surface of a park or a square, but as a three-dimensional spatially programmed system whose all three dimensions are treated equally.

diversity of shapes

The resulting site system has the same origin of form, but the final shape of each site is unique and different from others. Thus the repetitive systems are replaced by a series of differentiated spaces. The newly developed space offers a range of possibilities in which mutual complementation and interrelation offers a dynamic coexistence of various urban activities which provides the quality of an urban square and the natural qualities of a park.