Concordia Island: new visions

Using the actual Costa Concordia shipwreck — with its imponent presence and overwhelming, submerged physical mass — as a departure point, the winning projects in this competition offer new visions for the future of a wounded territory.

The New Concordia Island competition invited participants to rethink the Costa Concordia shipwreck, offering an opportunity to imagine the future of the site and that of the Giglio Island, off the coast of Tuscany. Using the actual shipwreck — with its imponent presence and overwhelming, submerged physical mass — as a departure point, architects were challenged to offer new visions for the future of a wounded territory.

Through differing design concepts, different cultural views have been expressed in the many submissions received. The jury selected projects that responded in a more comprehensive way to the questions raised by the contest, interweaving visionary approaches with pragmatic and real solutions.

Two macro-categories were identified by the jury as guidelines for the selection of the winning projects. In the first, the shipwreck is preserved in its entirety in the place of the accident, fixing permanently the image of the trauma. Thus, the shipwreck becomes a container, a fertile territory for reuse. In the second category, the shipwreck is manipulated through complex operations of cutting, removal and engagement to obtain new relations between the remaining fragments and Giglio Island. The memory of the accident is awakened through small development of meanings and objects.
Top and above: Alexander Laing e Francesco Matteo Belfiore, 1st prize, New Concordia Island Contest
Top and above: Alexander Laing e Francesco Matteo Belfiore, 1st prize, New Concordia Island Contest
Winners of the first prize Alexander Laing and Francesco Matteo Belfiore from London, propose to deal with the themes of the transformation of the wreck by exploring the dichotomy between removal and storage. The main operation consists of the sectioning of the shipwreck along the line of water, keeping the immersed portion and removing the portion that has emerged. The immersed fragment becomes a container for new activities, enabling crossing of the ship among paths, tanks of water and surfaces planted. This new place of memory is directly connected to the Giglio Island through two routes suspended on the water.
Vulmaro Zoffi, 2nd prize and FARM Cultural Park prize, New Concordia Island Contest
Vulmaro Zoffi, 2nd prize and FARM Cultural Park prize, New Concordia Island Contest
Second prize and FARM Cultural Park prize winner Vulmaro Zoffi from Milan uses the tool of section to remove the part of the ship currently emerged and the practice of disassembly to generate new surfaces of artificial reef in contact with the seabed. The removal of wreck's vertical planes reconfigures the part of ship immersed in a sequence of metal blades, allowing for the colonization of marine species. The project is powered by a reflection on the new atmospheres generated by the remains of the wreck. With the cycles of the tides the metal lines emerge on surface from the water, reminding the old shape of the Costa Concordia, while simultaneously reinforcing it through the presence of birds and insects, collected in a nebula to remember the tragic event.
Vulmaro Zoffi, 2nd prize and FARM Cultural Park prize, New Concordia Island Contest
Vulmaro Zoffi, 2nd prize and FARM Cultural Park prize, New Concordia Island Contest
Two winning projects were selected for the third prize. The first project, by Francesco Tonnarelli and Andrea Cippitelli from Macerata proposes the construction of a new line of connection between the harbor and the wreck, as well as the configuration of a new struture that redials some fragments and parts of the ship in order to remember the image of the wreck and the tragedy. The project is formed mainly by three phases and establishes the time of the dockyard and the staging of the processes of transformation of the wreck as well as the place of memory with the construction of volumes and platforms that offer new opportunities for uses related to activities connected with the sea.
Francesco Tonnarelli and Andrea Cippitelli, 3rd prize ex-aequo, New Concordia Island Contest
Francesco Tonnarelli and Andrea Cippitelli, 3rd prize ex-aequo, New Concordia Island Contest
The second project, by Wynn Chandra from London plans a cross between a machine and geology at the moment of the disaster that becomes a sort of first transformation. The project deals with the configuration of a new geological structure in which the natural water environments are tied inside of a matrix to the rock strata of the Giglio Island.
Wynn Chandra, 3rd prize ex-aequo, New Concordia Island Contest
Wynn Chandra, 3rd prize ex-aequo, New Concordia Island Contest

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