Redevelopment of Kapnergatis Square. Architectural Design Competition | Upon Lines

The square is of urban origin and use. It has derived from and it is defined by the widening of a street. The street is widened – its inherent linearity is broadened out – to host certain other activities which normally are not of a linear nature.

The project aspires to be an extended comment on this particular contradiction: how, that is, the functional needs of a square could be covered by the correlation of linear elements, insofar as the line is considered as a one-dimensional breathless length. Our position here is that lines are to bear the whole functional and morphological load of the square and – in keeping with the overall concept of the square – sitting elements and plantings, canopies and lighting fixtures, gradations and repetitions are to emerge from those lines.

Thanks to their simplicity and the ease with which they may be rearranged even within complex geometrical formations, linear elements can be extended to the adjacent pedestrian areas and, from there, to the voids of the urban tissue, as guiding lines that run through the city.