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Nicosia, the white city, the Sleeping Beauty of the Mediterranean, has suddenly woken up. The Cypriot capital is being thrust into the future by a series of transformations that nonetheless take into account the pace and quality of this ancient city, shaped by its long – essentially French gothic – medieval past and subsequent Venetian architecture that turned it into a fortress town. Later, urban sprawl beyond the central core produced an urban scene of indifferent quality in a city whose new, closely-packed quarters, although politically belonging to one of two factions, resemble each other as they push their way up the slopes of the hills around the city.
A medley of university campuses and residences extend into the parched yet beautiful countryside of this very European island, forever an outpost, and as such, a place where cultures have always met and mingled. In recent decades, Cyprus – now firmly part of the European Union and Eurozone – has once again become a laboratory, reinventing itself not only through tourism and education, welcoming the already-mentioned plethora of universities, but also by becoming part of the net-economy, providing a range of online – and hence borderless – business and banking services. Architecturally, this has triggered a redefining of urban spaces and the building of a spate of tall buildings, physical testimonies to the ongoing social changes taking place that, while in part self-celebratory, are also reinventing the city as a vibrant energized organism in the process of developing new ganglia. Nicosia, a beautiful ancient city, is also a place where the new soaring high rises never sleep. Sentinels watching over the community’s well-being, these new towers stand like those of San Gimignano, hosting business but also social activities, and, of course, offering sweeping views over the city to occupants gathered to enjoy a cocktail in the large loft on the...
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Building beyond Earth: The Challenge of Space Architects
Liquifer
Liquifer penned THE PLAN 152 editorial, entitled “Design beyond Earth: The Challenge of Space Architecture.”...
Residential Complex on Spallartgasse
driendl*architects
In THE PLAN 152 Highlights column, Michael Webb looks at driendl*architects and their residential complex in Spallartgasse, Vienna....
Tom Lee Park
Scape
The Landscape section of THE PLAN 152 looks at Studio Gang and Scape’s project for Tom Lee Park in Memphis, Tennessee....
