Korça Masterplan Albania

JA Joubert Architecture : Korça Mozaique
24 Jul 2009

JA Joubert Architecture, a young Rotterdam-based office, has won second prize in the international competition for the design of the City Centre Master Plan for Korça, Albania. Other participants in the twostage competition were Bolles+Wilson, 51N4E, Studio Daniel Libeskind and Domus Concept.



The Korça Municipality wanted a new ideas for their City Centre, which covers an area of 197.000 sqm. Korça, a city in the South-East of Albania, is set in a beautiful mountainous landscape and has a strong cultural and historical identity. JA, working in a team with Arup Amsterdam and landscape architect Nico Tillie, proposed to strengthen Korça's position as potential hub for eco-tourism to the surrounding mountains by creating a large green area for pedestrians, around which a focused, re-routed, infrastructure is organized. Existing green spaces within the plan are linked to create a large, programmable park. The existing architecture is as much as possible respected and given new functions. New buildings are carefully slotted in within the existing fibre. The request for a shopping quarter, as well as water elements in the park, is cleverly used in a grey water loop, which links the shopping centre and housing with the park through a large water buffer, used for natural cooling of the buildings, and irrigation of the park. By cutting up the Master Plan into 12 individual projects JA proposes a flexible solution for a complicated commission.

Korça Masterplan images / information from JA Joubert Architecture Planning, Urbanism and Architecture



Korça Mozaique - Building Information

Design: JA Joubert Architecture
Marc Joubert with Roos Marijn Limburg, Jeroen de Loor, Matilda Bahneva, Jorge Amaya, Clement Talbot
Engineering, Infrastructure, Lighting: Arup Amsterdam, Laurens Tait, Michael Davis, Siegrid Siderius
Landscape / Climate design, Sustainability: Nico Tillie