Šenčur Cultural Centre and Library

Here, next to the lake, which was fed by a stream from the North, two important paths crossed. One led from Kranj towards Kamnik, and the other led from Ljubljana towards Jezersko. Water and road were the two essential conditions for life and settlement. The original, clustered part of the village was created around the church by the lake, then it spread along the stream to the North and along the roads.

The starting point for the design of the new cultural center and library in Šenčur – a village in the Slovene Alpine region known as Gorenjska – are the typical architectural and material features of the archetypal house found in this region: a heavy stone or plastered base over which a timber part rises – a porch and a steep gabled roof, which makes good use of the volume above the rectangular floor plan. The latter, with its ridge oriented East-West, also follows the place's urban and landscape image.

The typology, although derived from anonymous architecture, with the reinterpretation of the essential parts of the vernacular house and the bend in the gable roof, results in a calm, yet outstanding image, befitting an important building for cultural activity in the very center of the village and the central square. The new building is clear in its architectural concept and is divided into three recognizable parts.

We wished for the new facility to be visually as much integrated as possible, despite requiring many programs in a small location. Consequently, the performance hall is entirely located in the basement, where it is organized as an effective black box.

In this way, the building above the ground floor is visually reduced, and the public space in front of it is freed up, continuing inside via a stepped base that hides all services necessary for the hall in the basement and the lively library on the upper floor.