International town planning competition "Urban redevelopment of the University Hospital of Santa Chiara, facing Piazza dei Miracoli"

2007

Pisa (PI), Italy

placement

Project finalist

team

Jean Pierre Buffì (leader)

Kollhoff Timmermann Gmbh

Paul Davis + partners

G2BA Architetti Associati

Cristofani Architettura

Maria Adriana Giusti

Studio Spira Srl

Alessandro Rossi

services engineer

Sistemi Industriali Srl

structural engineer

Studio Prof. Majovieky

landscape architect

Randle Siddely

client

ASL Pisa

Comune of Pisa

University of Pisa

The relevance that the hospital complex of Santa Chiara assumes as cultural assets in the historical city is connected to Piazza dei Miracoli by a physical, functional and symbolic contiguity. The presence on the place of a first hospital structure, documentable from the end of the XII century, is attested by the nucleus of plant with the thirteenth-century church of Santa Chiara. The moment of primer of the most recent process of transformation of the area is represented from the plans of the years '30.

The project intervenes on different scales in the aim of re-qualifing the use of an area with high historical and cultural values that at the moment are concentrated mainly on the monumental complex of Campo dei Miracoli (Dome, Baptistery, Cemetery). The destination of use proposed for the different buildings occupying the medical clinics are various: shops, offices, hotel, library, student services, museum, mess and private residencies.

The existing block wings, part of which have great historical and architectural value, will be restored. The recent buildings, a large number of which are realized in prefabricated materials and with no architectural qualities, will be removed and their volumes used for new edifices. Of strategic importance is the north margin of the hospital complex directly connected to Piazza dei Miracoli. The existing wall, which separate the two areas, will be kept and integrated into a visitors' centre with simple and stylized lines, with a wide window on the upper level overlooking Campo dei Miracoli.