Autore: Fjola

Con il progetto “Vlora Red Line” lo studio ha partecipato al concorso Vlora Waterfront Promenade, insieme alla collaborazione dell’architetto Elena Bignamini.

The relationship between Vlore and its shoreline has lasted for millennia. Because of its morphology, it was a natural harbour and over the centuries it has always had a strategic role, being one of the most important ports of Albania.
Today more than ever this centrality must be re-launched and developed at a European level and Vlore can totally take advance from its natural beauties and various attractions, starting with its waterfront recovery.
The project proposal is intended to enhance not only the life quality and level of services offer for the inhabitants, but also the tourist potential of the city, focusing on a “revaluation of the territory” implemented with tools and marketing strategies for tourism such as drivers for sustainable development.
The proposal has as its objective the development of a general vision of the future city that considers the parameters of efficiency, functionality and beauty of the city and its territory, from the ecological, morphological, social, aesthetic, historic, artistic, energetic points of view, taking into account accessibility, mobility, residential and settlement quality issues. The project defines a city of excellence involving social and anthropological aspects, where the quality of public spaces and the green areas helps encouraging social interaction and inclusion.

The first actions implemented are all part of the short-term program, they are the common base for other developments and evolutions and represent the aspects of unity and transversality expressed in the previous paragraphs.
The main elements, parts of this group are:
-Pavement: the base pattern is a grid, repeated along the entire promenade, which in every single segment takes different forms and functions.
The basic grid is made with local stone and every “cell” is treated with a particular processing and very soft changes of colour tone.
-Red ribbon path: this strong visual sign developing all along the coastline will give identity to the city and the waterfront, physically linking all the segments with a unique “fil rouge”. Its presence is absolutely not only esthetical, but its primarily function is, shaping itself also in different levels in height and width, to offer shadow and relax spots, becoming here a bench, then a covered space, a planter.
As the function change, so the materials used vary, from metal coated with red rustproof paint, to coloured wood and, when the path is marked on ground level, the pavement itself is coloured in red.
-Railway: as introduced before, the meaning of the implementation of rail tracks in the promenade has two faces, one symbolic, of real connection all across the coast, and one practical, since the rails will actually be used for transferring the services modules along the waterfront, according to the needs of the moment.
-Service modules: the structures hosting the services are designed as modular elements matched together or used individually, equipped with wheels to slide on the rails or fixed and placed in specific strategic points along the promenade.
-Urban furniture: the catalogue of benches and public lightings is chosen to be minimalist in the shape with an elegant effect. The concrete for the benches is resistant and durable, yet matches chromatically with the surrounding materials used. The metal for the lightings is coated with rustproof paint, so to resist to the seaside environment.