Arezzo Courthouse

Near the Medici`s Fortress, inside an historical park, the new building houses the main courtrooms and the Hall of Justice President headquarter and is linked to a neoclassical building, once a large hospital, to be restored and used for offices and archives. The design of the New Wing symbolises its environment: the rich vegetation of the park and the city`s medieval structure, which was protected by a belt of conch walls on one side and, on the other, open to the squares, gardens and the territory.
Also the New Wing is enclosed on the North side by a coved wall of flamed black granite slabs dark-grey tone. To the South, an undulating transparent sunscreen façade of stainless steel is shaped according to a geometrically warped geometry which is characteristics of the skin of many living creatures, including leaves. Those complex curvilinear forms can be built using only rectilinear elements. Thus, a silver bioclimatic foliage protects the interior spaces by a luminous shadow and blends with the park without clashing with the neoclassical nearby architectural elements. In the interior spaces, the astonishing reflection of the mirror-like polished black granite floor is contrasting with the greenish glazed envelop and the horizontal acoustic grey panel separated by narrow maple fascias.

Arezzo Courthouse by Elena Giussani in Italy won the WA Award Cycle 2. Please find below the WA Award poster for this project.