The plot where the tender was held is located in the off-plan area of the "Olive Groves" of the Municipality of Pylaia, in Thessaloniki. The building mass of the proposal consists of two individual volumes that are schematically unified with a potentially roofed corridor, which "writes" both on the floor and in the third dimension, creating a sense of unity. The unregulated siting of the existing trees led to polygonal forms in the plan and to prismatic irregular shapes in the third dimension. Trying to overcome this whim of the plot and turn it into a synthetic tool, we used the engraving that resulted from the forest restrictions by responding and behaving in the same way in an equally anarchic surrounding area. In the diversity of the shapes we managed to locate some important engravings, to reduce them to our basic grid and thus define rectangular and normally polyhedra. These pass to both buildings creating a single grid in the composition. The irregular polygonal line formed by the perimeter trunks of the trees is repeated in the building composition with the placement of the columns. These engravings are subtle and discreet in their contact with the forest area and become more intense, acquire dimension and are marked with different materials when they refer directly to the building composition. The single flooring clarifies the level of unhindered movement of pedestrians even in the case of its intersection with the movement of cars. A second element that works unifyingly in the composition is green. The planting is preserved and enriched for practical reasons, shading, but also for the delimitation of the space in direct correlation with the engravings.

A' Acquisition in a Panhellenic Architectural Competition
Client : Municipality of Pylaia
Location : Pylaia
Design : 2002
Design team : Manolis Votsis, Philippos Gerontakis, Ioulia Drouga, Evi Dimitrakopoulou, Natassa Fouskokolaki
Static study: Dimitris Giannoulos
Energy study: Konstantina Papakonstantinou
Phytotechnical study: Katerina Goltsiou