Building an apartment building with a cultural center in such a spatially and operationally intertwined situation is a complex task on many levels. Our proposal enters the site with the ambition to correct historical errors and with an effort to supplement the offer of functions and spaces that will lead to the gradual transformation of the housing estate into a desired urban address.

The primary effort is to create a place that becomes a destination. A space to the walk to, the place of the meeting. The proposal follows the free structure of a nearby panel housing estate, reinterpreting this structure on a micro scale and at the same time using the terrain step for the creation of a whole series of new urban spaces. The design represents a novel form of rental housing in Prague. It emphasizes the creation of a healthy and diverse community. It thus responds to years of proven principles from Western metropolises.

The design of New Eden combines three mutually complementary operations. A multifunctional hall on the ground floor, a community center and an open commercial parterre on the floors connected to the park and the square, and municipal rental apartments on the upper floors. The spaces between the apartments are designed to be shared, enabling the emergence of a vertical community, but at the same time, the design works with individual intimacy, much needed by everybody living in the city center.

The building has the ambition to become a local icon necessary for developing a relationship with the place. We create a space that residents take as their own. Contextual, yet unique.