Parking and business house on Zaloška Street

The Ljubljana Clinical Centre Urban Master Plan envisages the siting of two above-ground car parks to relieve traffic congestion in the area and to provide visitors with easy, transparent and accessible car parking when visiting the healthcare facility. Two locations along Njegoševa Road have been identified. More southerly, on the corner with Zaloška Street, it is located on the site of the old Šarabon factory in Ljubljana. The exceptional location, as a corner of the city’s island, is visually very prominent, located opposite Plečnik’s Hrvatski trg Park development. The decision to dedicate such an important space to surface parking has significant implications in terms of façade design, traffic noise management and the management of pedestrian and motor traffic flows.

The original design, the first prize-winning competition project, left most of the ground floor open as a flowing urban “parterre” through which pedestrian and cycle routes cross from Zaloška and Njegoševa Streets. Relatively little of the closed programme remains on the ground floor. The change of ownership of the project, which was sold from public to private investment, also changed the character of the ground floor. It accommodates a large grocery store and a medium-sized cosmetics store of free geometry with a central arcade, i.e. a small shopping centre. There is a parking programme on three basement and four above-ground floors.

The main design challenge, in addition to the design of the basic volume, is the façade curtain wall. It is designed as a sheath to ensure natural ventilation, but also safety by preventing falls to depth. The initial system is a rhythm of full and empty lanes at the appropriate spacing. The proportion of ventilated area is increased by adding perforations to the façade profiles. They are designed as partially open cast aluminium U-profiles, both a fence and a ventilation grille. By rotating the angles of the profiles, geometric patterns of shadow, reflection and shimmer are drawn depending on the orientation of the individual facades, weather conditions and time of day. The form is so expressive that it overrides the variations in colour that exposure to traffic emissions and sunlight gradually brings. As a result, the façade does not require cleaning and is visually extremely durable.

Its geometry is based on three triangular and quadrilateral figures, which rotate and twist around the entire continuous perimeter as they are assembled and rotated. The system module, which at the same time follows the constraints of transport, is assembled through a triangular geometry into a single, but internally complex envelope. The two-dimensional surface takes spatial inspiration at certain moments of the day, following the design principles of Renaissance geometric pavement patterns and optical illusions. The key to determining the form was the proximity to the city park, through whose canopy the geometry of branches, leaves and sun reflections are projected. The dialogue that the façade curtain establishes with the park draws it across the road, and the car park loses its traffic image and the contextual aggression it brings to the space.

A free-standing steel pavilion is located on the terrace and houses the office space. Geometrically, it follows the design of the façade, the perimeter being articulated by triangular window prisms oriented towards the characteristic views in the surroundings.

Authors of the project: BLENKUŠ Matej, FLORIJANČIČ Miloš