The “stone flower” reacts to weather changes and the time of day: in the hot daylight hours, it is only open from the north side; after sunset, it opens completely, becoming part of the urban cultural landscape. The deep transformable stone facade helps regulate the airflow to the building and the lighting of the inner street without the help of engineering systems: you just have to change the rotation angle of the slabs. The inner street continues the urban open space, connecting all floors in a spiral and leading to the outdoor amphitheater on the roof. During the day, the amphitheater is a city square, and in the evening, it becomes a comfortable stage, perfectly equipped for concerts and open-air film screenings. At the same time, the main venues for theater performances and other cultural events are the two halls on the first floor.
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LOCATION Beirut, Lebanon
CLIENT Ministry of Culture Republic of Lebanon
YEAR 2001-2004
STATUS competition
PROGRAM Cultural and Art Center
TEAM Y. Grigoryan, A. Pavlova
N. Tatunashvili
T. Kornienko, A. Staborovsky, Y. Kuznetsov
CONSTRUCTION M. Kelman
ENGINEERING IBZ (David Sokolowski), M. Shustova
PHOTO Y. Palmin