Albanian Jewish Museum in Vlorë (AL)

COMPLETENESS OF THE EXISTING

How to interfere when the building is complete already?

The existing is a landscape. What we put into this landscape must not harm it. So we leave this picturesque landscape of buildings as it is, because this way it is complete and beautiful.

THE THREE LAYERS

The landscape offers us three layers. Three steps to linger on.

The upper step already takes part of the existing’s place through a friendly colourful gabled house. On the vacant steps we place two more houses with also three levels each. This way the gables place themselves.

MERGING

From the square in the west mediating between the two neighbourhoods the two rooftops of the tower-like new building mark the threshold of the old city and mediate between the two contrasting quarters in hight and material. The two gables meld into one single gable on the east facade forming the self assured „fortified tower“ of the old city towards the inhospitality and craze for the huge and spectacular of the new town becoming part of the narrow and intimate neighbouring rooftop landscapes in form and proportion at the same time. Maybe, it reminds us that more often than not two become one …

SKIN AND BONES

The existing is simple and clear. The new shall not complicate a thing. We envisage the existing as a completely hollowed out mantle. Knocking off all material inside until we reach the raw masonry structure. This we treat until it shows its full beauty - raw or glazed. The new conducts oneself likewise: a shell not veiling its - concrete - materiality. Skin.

Everything we need inside - walls, ceilings - we produce through a tightly fitted skeleton from massive wooden boards forming the vertical and horizontal supporting structure as well as the filling for the surfaces. From these boards everything is placed inside the shell, from them exhibition and furniture arise. Bones.

THE SIMPLE

The opening is carried out through the north facade. Two of the entrances lead into the lobby encompassing the shop and the wardrobe in the filtering background. A third entrance leads into the vestibule, which serves as a separate main entrance for evening events - when the shop is closed already. Through this vestibule you get to the staircase with elevator, which is placed in the southeast corner, and opens access to all floors and each room without any corridors as it were.

Supply happens through the existing gate in the west facade of the building.

RENUNCIATION

What this building in its simplicity is able to provide, we also expect from it.

-    More volume harms the substance.

-    More room schedule complicates the utilization.

Thus the recommendation is the externalization of the administrative area, the absence of which does not impair the trouble-free handling of everyday museum proceedings. We wish for these offices to be accommodated in the vis à vis „Multifunctional Center for Regional Development“ allowing eye contact with the museum - only a few steps across the square - creating an opposite.