Evgeny Didorenko shared with us his project whose aim of a landmark was not to create a monument to the power of the industrial age and conquest of nature, but rather a monument to nature. Doing so would acknowledge the generous gifts nature has given us that was produced centuries and even millenniums ago. Brown coal – one of it’s gifts. More images and architect’s description after the break.
PEP – piece of earthen pie. A piece of earth cake. A cake, we eat it. It is big, useful, tasty. This is, in my opinion, a very good synonym for the mining industry and in particular for the production of brown coal, which still is one of the main unsustainable energy sources on the planet. But the general trend is ok, mankind refuses unsustainable energy sources, in favor to use ecologically safe, renewable, sustainable such as solar, wind, geothermal energy etc. This is the problem of reclamation of former industrial areas. Particular example – the former coalfields.
Memory and tribute. Landmark is the piece of the upper layer of the lithosphere, which is typical for these places. And this cut shows the local energy resources – brown coal.
Despite the fact that the landmark seems to be like a museum exhibit on the open air, it is still an energy source! Inside it is an uncapped pipe, opened to the air at the ends. Because of the pressure difference at the bottom and top of the pipe there is wind upward, which is successfully used by wind turbines, installed in the pipe. This energy will be enough for lightning of the tower all the year round.
So a piece of land with brown coal actually became a source of energy, but has acquired a new meaning, becoming sustainable and renewable. On the whole height of the tower there are several viewing windows in the form of «cheese holes», and it is also an allegory for the impaired eco and bio systems of the site.
BEP Baked Earthen Pie We dug this huge piece of pie, then baked it (cooked ore burned (energy production and as a waste – slag). I cut my baked cake and the nearby surroundings by huge coal mining machine, in order to combine it with surrounding area of the site, to make available to visit people, and in order to enlarge the impression. Therefore, in its center, it is still hot, red and still warm, like just from the oven.)
By burning coal, we obtain the energy and as a waste we get slag. This is the basic building material of my landmark. Slag concrete. The advantages of this material are obvious: cheap price (slag concrete consists of sand, water, cement and slag, instead of expensive filler from crushed stone), and of course it is – the memory, reminding us to the history of this area.
Light translucent metal staircase situated in the sawing and looks like a stretched tendons between the two parts of the pie. Canal, appeared on the site from cutting the soil and pie surfaces, I covered by translucent metal lattice ore grid, in order to achieve a feeling of emptiness beneath feet, before you get at the top of the cake to out looking view. It”s like a memorial path, ditch or canal, scar on the body of the earth, in the memory of how we are destroying the natural landscape and original ecosystem in process of searching of cheap non-renewable and unsustainable polluting fuel.
