Al Shaheed Park
Ricardo Camacho (PROEM), Sara Machado(STROOP) lead the
design of this Park comprising aprox. 56.750 sqm of building area, Habitat Museum, Memorial Museum, Visitor Centre, Administration&Management Offices, Celebration Gate, Old City Gate, Amphitheater with 900 spectator seats and Underground Parking for 900 cars.
This reconversion of a formal garden by Kuwait Amiri Diwan built in the early 1960's, to celebrate the city's modernization, and named as "Shaheed Garden" after Saddam's Invasion in memory of the war martyrs was officially inaugurated by the Emir of Kuwait following the National and Liberation days celebrations on the 3rd of March 2015 after being completed in December 2014.
The almost 20Ha urban park (800mx2.5km long) comprehends the reconversion of the formal Green Belt Park built between 1961-64 following the demolition of the Kuwait 'sour' (3rd Wall built in 1920) as a section of the Kuwait City Green Belt established by the First Master Plan, approved in 1952, and replacing the trajectory of this physical limit of the old city. After concerns raised by the community,the park was reclaimed in 2012 for the introduction of built program that can perform as ground for national celebrations and festivals. The Lead local Consultant TAEP teamed up with the international consultant Ricardo Camacho on the competition-winning redesign. The project included the integration of several buildings in the existing garden and the selection of a native vegetation scheme that could respond to water consumption restrictions, the harsh environmental conditions and urban maintenance practices. The project was developed and implemented in a record time of 22 months. The Park re-design process was determined and strongly affected by the precedent strategic and material value of the 1969-72 never accomplished proposal of Peter and Alison Smithson the "Rampart and Dune Gardens".
The new park contains two museums,large underground Car Park,Visitor Centre and Administration&Maintenance facilities.Other built elements are the Celebration Gate,formal entrance in the park with all receptions, the conservation of the old city wall gate together with the implementation of a 900 lower amphitheater defining the access through a tunnel to the Memorial Garden setting the frame for a Museum. On the opposite extreme of the park stands the birds nest at the edge of the Habitat Museum. In the middle of the Park a 9000m3 irrigation lake hides a telescopic pole for the national flag raise flanked by the Visitor Centre and the garden management and maintenance facilities. Both buildings are tentative translations of the courtyard building type. In the Visitors Centre, the ground is lowered and opened in two directions allowing cross ventilation-the programmatic instability of this building during the design stage generated a series of additions around the core, almost as an old town villa with its later additions; the mass resulting out of this process will define the constitution of the mound in its topography and volume -the soil is covering all annexes. Memorial Museum reclaims the shade under a free roof on top of 'pilotis'drawn through the regularity of the trunks in a grove of date palms that contain the different programmatic dimensions of the building divided in pavilions, from exhibition to cafeteria, offices and research centre. Under the slab the 'pilotis' expand outside the building as the trunks of a new palms grove that will lead you to the city through an tunnel. This movement is defined by a system of retaining wall-tiles moving sufficiently often into proximity with the geometry of the site limits allowing a number of pedestrian paths. These retaining elements when exposed as internal faces of the building contain toilets, prayer rooms and other service shared between the use of the museum and the park. The Habitat Museum,'Mathaf AlMawten', is a long sand dune planted with native plants that moves into proximity with the garden paths and covers the exhibition galleries, library, laboratory, offces, cafeteria, bookshop and a children learning centre. The park lake determines a limit to the vegetation and plantation capacity understating unity along with the native landscape of the country. The soil movement was there instrumental to recreate along the park a section of Kuwait from north to south, including saline depressions and Acacia woodlands. This movement integrates the buildings in the given matrix of services and existing trees and accommodates the selection of a native vegetation scheme that can respond to water consumption restrictions, the harsh environmental conditions and urban maintenance practices. The landscape proposal uses the existing grid, made of underground services and existing trees, that will distribute all the programmatic outdoor and indoor events –the buildings– that will be then converted into mounds due to a consideration of the acoustic studies – the noise protection-and the visual impact of the surrounding.At a larger degree this grid will be a medium climate mitigating wind, noise, dust and sun orientation. It generates a referential that is able to recognize the existing Park limits and trees, underground services, the Constitution Monument and Mecca orientation, as well as providing connections between all proposed elements through three pathways-the Emir path, visitors path and jogging track.
Considering the complexity of program and the short schedule for design and built, the owner and designer engaged all cultural and environmental entities, non proffit and governmental. During the construction and design of the project, the motivation of younger sectors of society became fundamental for the future management and content planning. The Park is today own by a civic organization (Al Diwan Al Amiri) and managed by a non profft organization of young volunteers (LOYAC). The Park program includes, among tours, sport activities and cultural festivals, leadership and professional training as well as children educational activities. After the failed attempt to build a new capital "The Silk City"the expectancies of Kuwait younger generations are now back to the existing town grounded in new values of national identity from social to environmental responsibility. The optimism around this ambitious project prompts ecological strategies and urban principles, with relevant precedents, pursuing the never consolidated green corridor between the capital and the residential neighbourhoods. Shaheed Park, reconversion plan seeks to implement a living system where the pre-existing ecological infrastructure can provide multiple possibilities of using the public space in a desert city evoking the memories of the past and encouraging future urban and environmental behave.
