Urban Sculpture

competition entry: 2nd prize
location: Ljubljana, Slovenia
project date: 2021
area: 50 m2
type: public
client: Outsider magazine and Centre for Creativity

project team: m.kocbek arhitects
Mojca Kocbek, Sara Bogičević

The location of the urban sculpture lies on an elevated plateau, in the immediate vicinity of Plečnik’s kiosk, at the important intersection of the National University Library, the French Revolution Square, and Križanke. The competition area opens towards Križanke with its forecourt, while the most visually prominent axis is the connection to the National University Library on the other side of the street. The main impulses in designing the concept of the urban sculpture were the monumentality of the library and the articulated street ambiance with its microenvironments – Plečnik’s exceptionally sensitive composition and rhythm in space, with which he effectively softened the edges of the street and the ground floors of cultural institutions.

The idea of ​​the competition solution is based on the desire to establish an urban ambience that will ‘seduce’ passers-by into the area of ​​urban sculpture, which would thus become an attractive and interactive point of public space. The most important thing is the experience of the passerby: how he moves in relation to the sculpture, how he perceives it, touches it and how he uses it. The emergence of urban sculpture thus connects and creates a new active meeting place tailored to the user. The space where people can linger and meet is that key segment of public space that makes a city ‘alive’.

The urban sculpture is designed in a way that, to the greatest extent possible, supports the characteristics of the material – compacted earth: compactness, layering, graininess or. texture and massiveness in its primary manifestation. The idea of ​​the sculpture is to present itself in an optimally compact volume on one side and a volume that would be placed and shaped according to the person… in a way, the sculpture continues the story of the National University Library and the micro-ambients along Vega Street.

Breakdown – the hollows of the volume of the sculpture respond to the greenery on its northern side and in the area of ​​the competition location, they respond to the views towards NUK, the street and the tobacconist on the V side and towards Križanke and the French Revolution Square on its southern side. They respond to a person who can use the sculpture in several ways: the seats are dimensioned in such a way as to give the person a feeling of shelter (being inside) or the possibility of socializing, contemplation and a vantage point. The sculpture is dimensioned in such a way that it can function as a place for sitting, socializing or presentations even on an elevated level, where a new perspective on the city’s happenings opens up – as an allusion to Plečnik’s raised plateaus along the street. At the same time, this raised surface can serve as a central table element for presentations and gatherings.