20/ Regulacija Kaptola, Radman Vrbanek © MMVIII Competition 2nd prize

Kaptol Master Plan, Zagreb

ZAGREB
Zagreb originated at the foot of Mount Medvednica. The division of power between the secular Gradec and the religious Kaptol is virtually mirrored in the topology with the Parliament and the Seat of the Government on the one hill and the Cathedral on the other. Both comprise the 'Upper Town'.
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Geographically, Zagreb is situated at the point of transition between low agricultural lands in the east and the topographically ‘rough’ region in the west. The very locus is determined by the most convenient crossing over the river Sava in the direction of the sea (south by south-west).
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The regular layout of the city is considered both its blessing and its curse. It is this regularity that sometimes impaired a more open and creative approach to planning, with the regretful succumbing to symmetry for the sake of symmetry.
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The morphogenesis of Zagreb is utterly linear. It starts from the elevated ground of the Medieval centres of power, descends into the 19th ct. blocks of the Downtown and eventually crosses the river to become a Modernist CIAM New Zagreb. This process of development could be easily captured in the form of consecutive sections, as I had indeed proposed in my competition entry for the official emblem of the Zagreb Tourist Board some years back.

KAPTOL
The requirement is to introduce not one, but three new museums for the Church, in the oldest and therefore highly protected area (where all architecture is effectively listed). It made it a mission impossible.
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We proposed to turn the plateau in front of the (neo-Gothic) Cathedral into a pedestrian zone by introducing a ‘caesura’, in the form of steps, which were to mark the threshold between the main city square (Trg Bana Jelacica) and the Kaptol area. This seemingly modest proposal would have major spatial consequences. In this we followed a precedent of the neighbouring town market (Dolac, 1929), which similarly went underground, replacing the existing slope for a cascade.
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The third museum was to be integrated in a linear fashion into the existing eastern wall facing Ribnjak Park, the former hunting grounds with fish ponds. (In contrast, the competing designers mostly explored ways to populate the existing buildings). This proposal seemed to strike the right chord with the client.
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The whole competition was symbolically charged, for it was here that the very institution of an open and anonymous architectural competition was first introduced a century ago. It was here that Viktor Kovacic (Croatian proto-modernist, the counterpart of the Slovene Plecnik, Austrian Wagner or Dutch Berlage) won the victory for the moderns against the ancients.