Swamp city
Bakir Mustajbegovic (CH)
Didier Hake (CH)
Nicolas Strambini (CH)
architects
Europan 9 Le Locle
runner-up
Located 1000m high, the project site initiates a process synchronized with the seasonal and hydrological rhythm of the city of Le Locle. The watertight subsoil provides an opportunity to make a statement with a strong and evolutionary natural environment: either marshland or lake. This landscape redefinition, as an extension of the city, is supplemented by the development of mixed programs: « the starters ». Over a period of time this extensible system will create a dense and fragmented landscape made of activity platforms. It is the prototype of a new relation between habitat and nature. A flock of tower buildings emerges from the low marshlands. The constant fluctuation of the ground creates unusual space sequences: Here, level 0 does not exist.
This project is connected to the following themes
Housing - Morphology
A bold and experimental morphology for a marshland housing proposal: the megalithic and timeless prototype of a new relation between housing and nature.
Nature - Hybridity / Juxtaposition
The programme is broken up into a series of towers/platforms. Here, inhabiting the site is a vertical experience, to allow the wet land to live autonomously to the rhythm and moods of the water and the seasons.