The decline of welfare, as intended in the modern age, has been often accompanied by the deterioration and the disappearance of the estate assets where its functions were performed. A material disappearance, in case of abandon or demolition, but also a symbolic disappearance, as the public building has become increasingly unassuming, dull, undersized, inefficient. Plant and Tecton’s Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, in Buda, goes against this trend, standing out as a contemporary ‘monument’ in its own right to the art of swimming.
A public pool in Budapest is a monument to the art of swimming
In Budapest, Plant and Tecton’s design for the Dezső Gyarmati complex is a stately, generous and almost luxurious institutional architecture.
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, Buda, Hungary, 2019
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, plan
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, basement plan
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, ground floor plan
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, gallery plan
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, sections
Plant and Tecton, Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool, elevations
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- Alessandro Benetti
- 27 January 2020
- Buda, Hungary
- Plant and Tecton
- public swimming pools
- 2019
Many elements contribute to this unexpected rehabilitation: the imposing barrel-vaulted ceiling covering the Olympic-size basin, the elegant ‘pleating’ of its elevations, the alignment of the entrance hall and of the two main pools (indoor and outdoor) along an almost processional sequence, as well as the global generosity of all spaces, both quantitatively and qualitatively speaking. The project can certainly be blamed for the affectation of a few golden details, such as the thin foils embellishing its façades. Inside the building, some finishing materials undeniably suffer from a certain pretentiousness, their selection affected by the choice to stick to the not so innovative concept of “the distinction between dirt [dark] and clean [bright]”. These are all venial sins, though, when considered in regards to the opening considerations to this reflection: the matter of principle, here, is way more important than the matter of taste.
- Dezső Gyarmati swimming pool
- public swimming pools
- Buda, Hungary
- Plan and Tecton
- Péter Kis, Bea Molnár, Anikó Tóth, Zsolt Krausz
- Béla Varga, Tamás Ükös, Péter Tokaji, Dalma Szunyoghy-Kollár
- Plant
- 2019