How can we create a modern suburban environment suitable for pedestrians in a 15-minute neighborhood - a new district with its own urban character that can withstand the ever-increasing pace of changes in human society?

This is achieved by creating a car-free district that emphasizes pedestrian and cycling transportation, designing compact development that forms both a clearly defined public space and an attractive living environment for future residents.
The concept of approaching public spaces stems from the fundamental idea of relocating cars to the outer edges of the development. The majority of parking spaces are condensed into three mobility hubs on the corners of the site. The implementation of blue-green infrastructure and the provision of quality public space for the residents of Slaný form a better connection between an agricultural park in the west to the city center in the east. With all amenities within reach and accessible recreational areas, the neighborhood will ensure a healthy and sustainable living environment.

Part of this design is the establishment of a central green axis, functioning as a retention valley and providing space for trees and biodiversity. It directs the outer landscape and waterflows into the new neighborhood and results in the
creation of a vibrant blue and green boulevard featuring diverse private and public spaces.

The urban structure that forms this proposal has been carefully crafted to create compact development with a diversity of typologies and financing models. It is also based on simplicity and elegance for sustainable and prospective construction methods, along with a reliable approach grounded in a connection to nature.

The Bio-Tech Archipelago is a great opportunity for the city of Mainz to build on its global reputation in the biotechnology sector and at the same time develop a city for everybody. Here, optimal conditions for research and development are combined with housing, leisure facilities and a vibrant landscape for people and nature. The design focuses on favoring cooling wind currents, networking local biotopes and preserving the expansive landscape and thus fullfill the requirements of the sensitive urban location and the associated responsibility for our environment.

Located as a gateway to the city on Saarstrasse, it communicates structurally, spatially and programmatically between the cultural landscapes of the outskirts of Mainz and the biotech axis. It is both the entrance and keystone of the westward expansion of the city and generates a variety of added urban ecological values and offers for the local environment and the city as a whole. The urban figure opens up to the open landscape in spacious corridors. The building mass is divided into four sub-areas that unite to form a flowing archipelago-like urban landscape around a common open space.

The focus of our project is, on one hand, the careful urban integration of approximately 43,000 m2 GFA (realization part) and 10,000 m2 GFA (conceptual part) of dense housing into the existing morphological and ecological context, taking into account imposed restrictions and desires. On the other hand, the identity of our project arises from intense coordination and integration of urban planning, architecture, ecology, and landscape design.

Characteristic of the existing urban structure of the broader surroundings of the competition area is the loose construction with small and medium-sized structures. In contrast to this morphology, the future urban fabric east of the railway track is planned as an urban densified perimeter block structure (Munich Northeast Ideas Competition). Our project establishes a context-related connection to these two different spatial conditions while simultaneously creating its own strong local identity.

To achieve this, our design is structured into overlapping levels of order, creating differentiated and precise spatial relationships: The construction structure is divided into four typologies. In the west along Marienburger Strasse, the existing structure of rowed, rhythmically offset, small-scale buildings is appropriately complemented to ensure spatial permeability. This is followed by a loose sequence running north-south of individual building volumes (urban villas) increasing in mass and height, set in a landscape park-like arrangement. A third row consists of elongated structures on the east and north sides, which are more monolithic and taller in the northern part, gradually transitioning to a sequence of architectural individual units towards the south.

A new entrée to the Villa Hügel

Based on the design principle "Landschaf(f)Stadt", the new Brandenbusch-Eck is a forward-looking and iden-tity-creating entrance to the Brandenbusch neighbourhood and the Villa Hügel in Essen. A neighbourhood that is being developed sustainably and serves as a centre of life for a broad range of residents. A small-scale and diverse density creates a lively place, uses resources sparingly, utilises infrastructure efficiently and relies on the mobility of the future - eco-mobility.
Building on the strong scenic framing of the Brandenbusch neighbourhood by the Kruppwald forest and the preservation of valuable biotopes and existing trees, the "green carpet" completes the new entrance to a closed biotope network. This public green space is designed as an inviting gesture to the Hügelpark and the Villa Hügel itself.
Brandenbusch-Platz, as a publicly effective square and protected new centre, links the new neighbourhood with the existing listed estate and promotes interaction. A new connection is created at the usage level: the social and cultural facilities in the neighbourhood are placed in a new context by the design. The connection between the church and the school is created by the Brandenbusch corner.

Closing the gap between the university hospital in the north and the biotechnology campus in the south, the THEORETIKUM complements the science and business location in the north-west of the city of Halle an der Saale. The development site is simultaneously integrated into the urban space, functionally connected to the research and teaching facilities and integrated into the landscape. The proposed concept sees itself as a gradually growing, learning and responsive campus that integrates the existing and takes a holistic view of the new. With innovative research and technology clusters, attractive teaching and learning facilities as well as new service and communication areas, functions are bundled, synergy effects are created and potential for supra-regional impact is generated. As an adaptive campus, the THEORETIKUM is more than its individual clusters.

The urban structure is formed by the campus loop as an address-giving backbone, a functional overlay of the clusters, building plots with adaptive development options and the integration of landscape qualities. Buildings with independent appearances (old - new, small - large, flat - high, square - rectangular) fit together playfully and, along with the uniform open space design, form a versatile, coherent overall picture. The slightly twisted structures create interesting and surprising room sequences and integrate existing elements (buildings, trees, paths) during the various expansion stages. Three existing high-rise buildings will be retained in the long term as a highly visible ensemble and will be integrated into the campus development.
The northern entrée forms a counterpart to the UKH and is visually and functionally linked by the redesign of the junction. The pandemic center as the first building block is set back slightly and, together with the campus kiosk, conveys the leap in scale from the existing high-rise building to the loose residential development in the surrounding area. The southern entrance is designed at the mobility hub with an active ground floor. The technology and research centers will be realized as compact building blocks with inner courtyards or atriums and base floors. The active heart is formed by the service and communication center at the intersection of the urban north-south and green east-west connection.

From an Mining Hole to climate-positiv urban destrict

The Jüchen South urban planning competition deals with a largely unanswered question: How do we want to deal with the post-mining landscape? And in particular: What does a settlement look like that is built on such an area? Do we leave it at the legally stipulated reclamation and pursue settlement development on a greenfield site? Or do we try to live up to the responsibility that comes with urban development and use the opportunity to make a fresh start, to make amends and to mitigate the damage done to the landscape and the global climate?

Our contribution formulates a district as a symbol of this new beginning and an exemplary path for the future. It is based on the circular bioeconomy as an innovative economic model. Based on circular principels, the concept focuses on the sustainable value creation of local resources, especially soil, and thus creates the basis for an attractive and healthy living environment. The concept envisages laying the foundation for a new cultural landscape in Jüchen - the Jüchener Stadtwald - on the artificially created landscape area of the former open-cast mine. This forest forms the landscape architectural foundation for the settlement development, has top priority as an efficient ecosystem, is the basis of a sustainable healing process and a central element of the circular economy. It stores CO2, provides climate-positive building materials and food, produces energy, functions as a sponge forest and retention area, protects against noise, wind and dust and offers diverse leisure and local recreational functions. The urban forest in its various typologies forms the economic, urban structural and identity-creating basis of the new urban district.

Hemelingen on the move - A new urban neighborhood Könecke-Areal

The revitalization and reintegration of inner-city industrial areas is one of the most important planning tasks of the day. These areas are usually excellently developed in terms of infrastructure, which supports sustainable development, and can save a lot of gray energy. Complex ownership, emission sources and soil contamination are challenges that require innovative, robust and flexible urban planning concepts. The design takes advantage of the unique opportunity to free the area from its infrastructural island location in order to reconnect the districts of Hastedt, Seebaldsbrück and Hemelingen by building an urban bridge. Together with the southern (former) Coca-Cola site, which was part of a former urban design process, it forms the new center of Hemelingen.
The vacated areas will provide what the district needs now and, in the future, - that is an affordable and diverse housing mix, adaptable spaces for working, learning, leisure and culture, but above all it is urgently needed public green space. The new neighborhood park forms the green heart of the entire district and creates a strong address to the future premium bike route that will connect the neighborhood with the center of Bremen.

Like a coat, the development wraps itself around the greened-out Ludwigsfeld estate. It does this conceivably loosely and discreetly over open spaces. The dissolution of grains and densities of use is small-scale in relation to the existing buildings and protects them from noise at the edges.

The concept proposes four different urban building blocks to complement the Ludwigsfeld settlement: green residential courtyards, active neighborhood houses, a cautious addition to the existing buildings, and flexible neighborhood garages.
Through compact and green residential courtyards with a diverse appearance, a variance in the number of stories and vertical greening, the targeted density is achieved with high residential and open space quality. In relation to the existing buildings, the residential courtyards dissolve into an open development, which also adapts in terms of the number of stories and mediates via community gardens.
Four neighborhood houses at a central location in the neighborhood link the living with base areas for supply, social facilities and community uses. As project building sites, special forms of housing can be implemented here in alternative development models. Through a striking design and the active ground floor areas, they are crystallization points in the public space.

The design supports the goal of a sustainable and CO2-neutral neighborhood development. The infrastructures required for the planned energy concept are integrated into the urban design and areas for energy generation are demonstrated accordingly.