dezeen

Seriously?

soooo…this is a masterplan? wow.
whatever happened to architecture?

The space may be great, but the design is lazy.

looks like they (mvrdv) think that people have no use for windows in albania…

Has anyone seen my legos?

… you MUST be kidding me

it….. rocks

hahahahahahaha

Really? So blocks tossed on the site, rendered with default settings. Brilliant!! Why waste your time with materials and glazing? It’s a winner.

Tirana Rocks: perfect for people who hate windows!

those renderings are too funny to get upset about….

What on earth is this ?? ARCHITECTURE??– NO WAY!!

Those who live in rock houses shouldn’t throw glass.

Composition wise, the arrangement doesn’t seem too bad. Without plans, elevations, sections, detail, materials, or architecture, this does seem really lame. The current trend of rearranging cheap volumes has hit a new low with the seeming lack of detail that says architecture. At least Rex added the things needed to make a building in his pile in Louisville.

Were these volumes created from something, or were they just determined to be the “right” size. Was the process more of a discovery when someone was told to clean out the mail room at MVRDV? Do we really think Albanian’s aren’t sophisticated enough for anything more then a pile of concrete boxes?

What the f… is going on?

MVRDV… resembles romans algarisms… what a mistake, we’re talking about stone age families here.

Stop posting crappy material just because the author is famous. I’m sure mdvrdrvddr did some plans and sections for the competition, why not throw those in along with the renderings?

i think it is about time architects spend less time glossing over images of their shallow projects [zhaaahhhhaahahaha] and leaving more to the imagination [or lack of it] of the viewer. I like this scheme and in my head has a lot of potential. Less gloss less ‘realism’ more imagination. By the way this goes to show how little people care about understanding concept and how much the ‘money shot’ becomes the project… death to superficialism, long live hierachitecture…

Easylazy, that all true. Stil hey it is in Albania, look at the contaxt and its quality. is there anyway to believe that this project will be a better architecture?

I think it looks like the master plan that gehry did for brooklyn a long time ago http://curbednetwork.com/cache/gallery/3138/2467838578_44a8c71f5f_o.jpg

I’m not very impressed with this proposal at all! particularly because the architecture that MVRDV usually produces is beautiful.

But I”m sorry Mr “one” who left a post above, just because Albania is a country which is still recovering from its time under communism doesn’t mean that they don’t deserve a quality piece of architecture to set the scene for their future development.

A project like this has got the ability to really change the urban life of the capital city, but from what I can see it has fallen way short of that target.

no windows?…how groundbreaking

Love it…One of their better works recently!

hey guys, dun forget that in the 21st century, is WAAArchitecture~

baby Godzilla playground

it is still very OMA

wow…another brick in the wall…and i’m not talking about crappy renderings…can anyone be so kind to tell me why do we need more interpretation of an interpretation…why do we need another child’s play…and why do we need architects…exactly

Thanx Mr.B for your reference. I do think that the project makes it hard to judge if it will be or won’t change the current situation for a better one.

While I do agree that Albania deserves such change, I was referring to come critics wantingto see ‘Danish’ perfection in this place, which obviously not the case.

Haters. This project rules.

Does anyone know here what a MASTERPLAN means?

yes…so ?!?

Whatever happened to one of the coolest architecture practices of late 90s?

I get pissed knowing that they’re getting away with it…
this is most probably once again the result of massive lobbying
one known name involved and a jury stops the search for quality

next book of mvrdv is called ‘PR-MAX’ , I guess.

Confidence is what allows them to get away with this seeming lack of effort. They know any eventual development process will involve deciding where to put the windows (and doors for that matter, though no one in this forum was sticking up for them). Don’t mean too much whether they show nominal openings or not. This is just a trigger for investment and urban change.

Here is another montague of the MVRDV project that is not published here. For those who think albanians dont use windows

http://www.tirana.gov.al/common/foto.php?f=images/Pictxffw1_m.jpg&t=Maketi%20i%20studios%20fituese%20MVRDV

I normally like MVRDV’s work but I have a hard time seeing what needs this project is responding to except for the marketing needs of an ex-commie state with a broken self esteem.

wow. i really like it. very bold, eh!? design like you don’t give a damn. haha. but seriously, how can people breathe inside those?!

looks like they did it during coffee break, while playing jenga.
too bad there aren’t any plans or sections.
The renders dont tell much about it except that it looks way to massive.
By the way, why is the same image (or almost) posted twice?

what a disaster . what a mess. this project sucks

Besian, thanx for the link, now I say I change my attitude toward this project.

I think its a ploy..like the Herzog&d.Meuron did with Tate No.2…they post some images, which are very prelimnary and totally open to crit and interpretations…and then they make adjustments

So i guess from now on, we’ll see more and more of ‘What the general public want to see’ instead of actual stuff that makes architecture.

I would like to see what Carlos Ferrater had submitted thought

I really don’t know why people continue to take Winy Maas and co. seriously.

Their typical pseudo-iconoclastic claptrap is fine and good on paper, but when applied to real people (in Europes poorest country no less) it is just insulting and irresponsible.

remark for all of the collegue-architects in here: this is a ‘masterplan’, and it’s not supposed to present buildings, only a vision on this site (as a whole).. the ‘blocks without windows’ just draw the maximum building volume one should/could build on this site, so it’s up to other architects to create a project within this context.. if this is a good context I doubt, because to my opinion mvrdv didn’t push this question far enough.. but that will only be clear once there are real proposals for the buildings..
so: look a little bit further than the image as an image and do the criticism a favour

Herzog & DeMeuron intern: “ups.. I just dropped these blocks on the floor, what on earth am I supposed to do with them now?”
(leans over to pick them up)

Herzog: “DONT MOVE AN INCH! THAT!!! THAT!!!! DEMEURON! COME HERE QUICK! NO I DON’T CARE ABOUT YOUR MOKA LATTE LOOK AT THIS ITS BRILLIANT!
(DeMeuron comes in with pieces of cake on his tie and a smudge on his cheek)

DeMeuron: “What’s the freakin’ rush Herzy?”
Herzog: THIS IS OUR PROJECT!!!
(GASP from DeMeuron)
DeMeuron: SALLY THE CAMERA QUICK!!!!

JAJAJAJA UPS! it’s MVRDV! JAJAJAJAJA!!!!! same thing!

Bye bye, happiness…

however, a lot of people have something to say, we talk about it.
Interesting, I guess

It’s important to inform yourselves on the project before making ignorant comments based on a couple of renders posted here.
It’s also important to inform yourselves on what’s actually happening in the city of Tirana. I bet you all have no clue whatsoever as to what is in plan for the city.
In this youtube link you can see a small video presentation of the project which is in its initial study phase http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81grr_5Ftvk
Nothing is final yet. This is just the concept idea.

This looks like the very first assignment in my first semester of university before we even started doing any designing and architecture

MVRDVoring…
ay caramba!

WTF!!!!…. I mean come the F*$(k on! what is this?
this is craptastic! at its best…We need some plans, sections, diagrams
something! to bust this thing open…cause right now it looks like jupitar
lost its teeth! and it fell into Tirana.

a new era of stonehenge was born . signed MVRDV.

the link proves
that mvrdv is making a copy of their own work
more of the same - boring

and far from genieus

Having seen the link provided by Besian which in my opinion I coin as ‘too much visual garbage’. I much tend to favour the monolithic monstrosities rendered above. Their obvious intention to posting those images was to create a very natural environment, its much easier on the eye viewing rocks than a colourful spagetti mish mash.

My god poor ..poor Albanian peoples! Genetics failed this guys for sure.. what a denial of the structuralism heritage. If Aldo where alive he would get a hart attack
Corb would have been happy about this one though!

to OLS:

it’s still crap…even after the movie
I would say: childish.

This is amateur work from circus like architects. I was going to work with MVRDV once, boy im glad that didnt work out.

Also I dont see how this references the struggle between Georgia and Russia at all, the blocks arent even damaged?

It reminds me of a grad school project a saw once… “I took some rocks off the desert floor and dropped them in a pile several times until I found an arrangement I liked”.

It went over very poorly.

this is beautiful. superbly beautiful

shameful at this stage…but this is not architecture so it doesnt even deserve comment in that sense.

what are those poor interns going to do when they have to make this in to architecture?

This project in no way is iconoclastic… if that was the attempt it fails.

Randomness can be very interesting….but i belive it might need to seem a bit less forced. This is a building that if not designed very carefully from this stage on will become an eyesore and failure in the near future.

It seems that there are a lot of easy opinions on this forum. How can you say anything about this project without knowing anything? Windows? What?
It’s a competition people, for a masterplan… for now it seems like a unique project which could be a very interesting one.
So leave your ignorant comments home, and talk with some arguments.

fallen stones in tirana? not the statement i would liek to seen built over there… the comments here are a bit harsh but this project looks very “fastfood” like… just throw a couple of blocks on the site and call it intereesting space and philosophical way to design? nooo… to fast foreward for me… i can agree on some of the “fuck context” projects but then they have to be strong on the content site! blocks as houses are not that strong…

Pity the poor, innocent Albanians…”Forward men, into the past!” Anyway, Heraclites was wrong, you can in fact step into the same river twice -or three or four times…
Another case in which a moisturized, metrosexual jury premiates yet another big yawner.

The greenest part of tirana it’s going to be a mass of rocks … a winy mass of rocks …
People in there deserve it !

It’s not the problem on the renders, this are just to show an idea of the project.But Tirana doesn’t need a second downtown with some “rocks”
that will destroy the only grean part of the city that is still intakt or
some part of it.And the funi thing is that Tirana has 6% grean and this project will destroy 1.7%.
Which city in the world has less than 5% vegetation ?

Well in fact this is just a Masterplan, in reality it won’t be like this, the construction will start in 2010, MVRDV has a lot of time to project the windows…etc. A possible view of this project is this:http://bustler.net/index.php/article/tirana_rocks_mvrdv_wins_lakeside_competition_in_albania/

This is part of a plan for Tirana’s rehabilitation and it’s a big investment.