For almost 20 years, they have been working together to design spaces that are understood as comprehensively as possible. They bond buildings with the landscape, organize spaces, and restore cities to pedestrians. Marcin Brataniec and Urszula Forczek-Brataniec received the Cracow SARP Award for outstanding architectural work on March 13 this year. Below are some of the most interesting realizations in {tag:Studio}'s prolific oeuvre.
They have known each other since their school years. He is an award-winning architect, vice president of SARP's Krakow branch for creativity, competition judge and winner of the SARP Gold Badge and Concrete Oscar. She is a professor and dean of Landscape Architecture at the Cracow University of Technology, a designer of public spaces and landscape architecture and author of research papers on architecture. Marcin Brataniec and Urszula Forczek-Brataniec have created dozens of projects that have set trends (although they don't follow trends themselves!) and provided them with recognition in the community. Which of them have received the most publicity?
Revitalization of the Old Town of Gorlice
photo:. Marcin Brataniec
IC
The beginning of the activity of eM4. Pracownia Architektury. Brataniec took place in 2007, and, as they explained in the pages of A&B, it was a beginning that stemmed from a very specific need - participation in a competition to revitalize the old town of Gorlice. This is the hometown of both Marcin Brataniec and Urszula Forczek-Brataniec, so they felt the need to add their own contribution to its development.
Revitalization of the Old Town of Gorlice, 1st prize in the competition, design and implementation 2007-13,
Project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Urszula Forczek-Brataniec, Damian Mierzwa
The concept, which won the competition held in 2007, was to organize the chaotic development of the market square and the entire Old Town area. What made the biggest difference was the spatial integration of the market cut by the provincial road. Although the road still runs through the place, after the revitalization it is no longer an element that aggressively divides Gorlice's center in half. Familiarity with the place made Marcin Brataniec and Urszula Forczek-Brataniec's design an extremely nuanced concept, meticulously "patching" holes in the buildings and effectively using the complex geometry of the area. Although the revitalization of Gorlice's old town was the first project under the eM4 banner, it managed to win a host of awards, including the top prizes in the competitions Life in Architecture for the best public space 2013-14and TUP for the best developed public space in Poland 2015, an honorable mention at the International Architecture Biennale in Krakow 2015 or a nomination in the European Prize For Urban Public Space 2014.
It has always been important to me that the person for whom we design should be comfortable, pleasant and cozy in this space. We traveled a lot. I lived in Italy for six months, then we went to France. We had a look and wanted people to be comfortable in our projects, too. The era of cars has indeed created an oppressive space. That's why the project for Gorlice is called Merging and Organizing.
- Urszula Forczek-Brataniec told A&B in 2023.
The revitalization of Gorlice's old town set the direction of the architects' pair's later work - it became public spaces, understood as both cubic architecture and urban squares or parks.
indoor swimming pool in Miechow - design and realization 2007-12 project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Damian Mierzwa
photo:. Marcin Brataniec
closed/open pool
The concept for the swimming pool in Miechow was created at the same time as the project to revitalize Gorlice's Old Town. It's a project that demonstrated the importance in eM4 of the relationship between architecture and the place in which it is built. Although the indoor swimming pool, by definition, separates the interior of the building from its surroundings, views of the most beautiful things in the area flow into the building thanks to the glazing, which acts as a carefully selected frame in the building.
indoor swimming pool in Miechow - design and realization 2007-12 project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Damian Mierzwa
photo:. Marcin Brataniec
The enclosed building opens up only the zones of entrances, necessary illumination and attractive views from and towards the interior. The building blocks are unsophisticated, simple materials - concrete brick, wood, stone and glass. The roof structure that protects and connects the interior spaces is an afterimage of the tangled trunks and branches of the park's trees, referring to the archetype of the wooden covering of masonry shelter walls.
- write the architects about their realization.
Market Square in Mszana Dolna - design and realization 2012-13 project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Urszula Forczek-Brataniec, Maciej Gozdecki, cooperation: Paulina Nosalska
photo: Marcin Czechowicz
market square after hours
The revitalization work carried out in Mszana Dolna has also been nominated for numerous awards. In this small town, eM4 worked on a study of the revitalization of urban areas, the revitalization of the market square and the renewal of the City Park. A marketplace designed in 2012 brought the studio great fame. The new infrastructure replaced the former market square, which for years had been a threshing floor filled with unsightly stalls and booths. After the 2013 work, the market square between Mszanka and Wladyslaw Orkana Street was filled with several rows of shelters with geometrized, triangular covers.
Market Square in Mszanka Dolna - design and implementation 2012-13, project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Urszula Forczek-Brataniec, Maciej Gozdecki, cooperation: Paulina Nosalska
drawing: Marcin Brataniec
The Market Square in Mszana is architecture designed "for the people," so in addition to the stalls, exploring the typologies of marketplace architecture, there were benches, flowerbeds and elements of small architecture using the transformed motif of the umbrella, characteristic of mountain towns. The strength of the project is also evidenced by the way the space was shaped - the groups of shelters were distributed in such a way that it was possible to avoid creating a labyrinth typical of marketplaces, while creating a space between them with the function of an urban square.
As in the case of the revitalization of Gorlice's Old Town, the market square in Mszana Dolna has gained not only national, but also international publicity. This time, however, the distinction was of a much higher caliber, as the new market square was among the buildings nominated for the 2015 Mies van der Rohe Award.
Science Center in Podzamcze Chęcińskie - design and implementation 2008-13, project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Urszula Forczek-Brataniec, Maciej Gozdecki, Damian Mierzwa cooperation: Paulina Nosalska
photo: Juliusz Sokolowski
as if it grew out from under the ground
The construction of the Leonardo da Vinci Science Center in Podzamcze Chęcińskie was completed in 2015. The project, which is a revitalization of a former manor near Chęcin castle, focused on the construction of a multifunctional educational center whose architecture blended with the terrain and the existing architectural premise. The Science Center in the western part "grew" out from under the ground, gently emerging from ground level and allowing visitors to enter the extensive roof garden. On the eastern side, the mass of the building was abruptly cut off, and the vertical wall took the form of a cross-section showing successive geological layers.
Science Center in Podzamcze Chęcińskie - design and realization 2008-13, project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Urszula Forczek-Brataniec, Maciej Gozdecki, Damian Mierzwa cooperation: Paulina Nosalska
photo: Juliusz Sokolowski
The new building complements the composition of the old manor house complex and the former manor house, creating an internal space - a square with a pond. Its relationship with the open landscape has been emphasized by plunging part of the volume below ground level and covering it with a gently rising green roof.
- write the architects about their realization.
As with other realizations, the Leonardo da Vinci Science Center has been deeply integrated into the context of the site - in addition to integrating with the landscape, the education center building organizes views of the Old Town Castle and Chęciny Castle.
ZSOMS sports hall on Grochowska Street in Krakow - design and realization 2014-17 project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Damian Mierzwa cooperation: Marek Bystroń
photo: Juliusz Sokołowski
championship architecture
The theme of sports facilities was not abandoned after the success in the competition for the design of the swimming pool in Miechow. In later years, an indoor swimming pool in Nowy Targ and a sports hall for the Sports Championship School Complex on Grochowska Street in Cracow were also built according to the eM4 design. The latter turned out to be a clever solution to the problems plaguing the school's spatial layout, which had become complicated and illegible through years of expansion. To solve the "Gordian knot", the architects proposed building a large hall that literally melts into its surroundings. Its facade became part of the plaza in front of the building, a climbing wall and grandstands that grew directly out of the ground.
ZSOMS sports hall on Grochowska Street in Krakow - design and realization 2014-17 design: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Damian Mierzwa cooperation: Marek Bystroń
sketches: Marcin Brataniec
warsaw meteor
In 2020, the Stone Education Pavilion landed in Warsaw's Golędzinowo district like a meteor. The building, which took the hearts of Varsovians and Varsovian women by storm, was intended to resemble a post-glacial stone. References to nature are a constant element of the works created at eM4. Studio of Architecture. Brataniec. The simplest building blocks used to create the swimming pool in Miechów or the local raw materials used to build the Science Center in Podzamcze Chęcińskie were only a prelude to the form of the Kamień pavilion, the shape of which is the result of creativity, constructional mastery and an in-depth study of the characteristics of the landscape in which the building was located.
Kamień educational pavilion and clearing in Golędzinów, Warsaw - design and realization 2015-20 project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Urszula Forczek-Brataniec, Marek Bystroń, Maciej Gozdecki, Damian Mierzwa cooperation: Jan Wojtas, Paulina Nosalska
photo: Marcin Czechowicz
When we designed the Golędzin pavilion on the Vistula River in Warsaw, it wasn't just designing a pavilion. We looked at the place, we reached into its deepest history. What we are realizing will become some distant place again in a moment, both in space and time. Everything is fluid, everything will turn to stone.
- Marcin Brataniec said about the pavilion.
In 2022, the educational pavilion Stone became the second object nominated for the Mies van der Rohe Award, while in 2024 it will be part of the Transformations exhibition of the 4xModernity series being carried out at the National Museum in Krakow.
Educational pavilion Stone and Glade in Golędzinow, Warsaw - design and realization 2015-20 project: eM4, authors: Marcin Brataniec, Urszula Forczek-Brataniec, Marek Bystroń, Maciej Gozdecki, Damian Mierzwa cooperation: Jan Wojtas, Paulina Nosalska
photo: Marcin Czechowicz
You can see more projects at the exhibition "Architecture and Landscape" available until April 11 at the Architecture Gallery SARP Krakow Branch at Szczepanski Square 6 in Krakow. And if you want to learn more about the design philosophy, inspirations and tastes of the winners of this year's award for outstanding work, we invite you to read the issue of A&B edited by eM4. Architecture Studio. Brotherhood!
