Sándor Petőfi cultural centre, Hungary
Prijsvraag
An international contest is being held to upgrade the Petőfi Sándor cultural centre in Kiskőrös near Budapest.
The two-stage contest will select a team to create a new home for the cultural centre which is named after the Hungarian poet and liberal revolutionary Sándor Petőfi who was born nearby.
The project will see the existing cultural centre and its library as well as a neighbouring ‘old party house’ demolished. The new complex is to be constructed on the site of the old party house.
According to the brief: ‘The new Cultural Center, born on the site of the old party house, will serve residents of the city as well as visitors more efficiently with its festive atmosphere and modern public spaces. It will be a building worthy of Kiskőrös’ cultural and historical significance from an architectural, functional and operational point of view.
‘Through high-quality coordination of the architectural, landscape and open-air architectural tools, applicants will ensure that the Petőfi birthplace is more prominent than it is today.
‘With professional landscape architecture solutions, taking into account the needs of large-scale outdoor events, they will present the possibility of expanding Petőfi Sándor Square.’
Kiskőrös is a small settlement located around 100km south of Budapest. The town was the birthplace of Petőfi who is considered to be the national poet of Hungary.
The contest comes two years after London’s Grimshaw won an international competition to overhaul and expand Budapest’s main Nyugati station. Fellow UK practice Studio Egret West won a £15,000 third prize in a competition for a major retrofit of Budapest’s abandoned market halls in 2021.
The latest project aims to create a new ‘characterful, emblematic’ home for the Sándor Petőfi cultural centre which continues Kiskőrös’s ‘architectural traditions in a modern but appropriate way’ while also meeting all of the brief’s functional needs.
The competition results are due to be announced on 9 December and a £73,500 (35 million HUF) remuneration fund has been set aside for the winners.