Introduction
The Blue Clay Country Spa competition pursues provocation of a decisive contemporary issue. The rise of sweeping urban migrations of the last quarter century coincides with a disciplinary preoccupation of architecture and the city, manifested in theory and praxis. This has all but left the vast expanse of any non-urban territory virtually uncertain. The competition invites students and professionals to contemplate the economic, cultural, and architectural implications of inhabiting the non-urban, through an ecotourist facility in Latvia.
Viable submissions interrogate the inherent tensions between subject and object, building and site, leveraging established programmatic and site constraints. Particularly successful projects engage the agency of typological form — including for instance, the courtyard, shed, garden and pavilion. This is particularly significant in a landscape unadulterated by buildings. Selected entries establish social collectivity through circulation and parti, while prescribing distinct individual and programmatic experience through space, material, and form.
1st Prize Winner
Blue Clay Country Spa
Portugal
Jury feedback summary
The first place entry for the Blue Clay Country Spa is successful in its reprogramming of a spatial archetype, the hortus conclusus, or walled garden. The primary gesture of the project is a circular promenade that unites each functional space of the spa. The wall circumscribes an interior garden and orchard, enclosing the spa with a colonnade that functions both as wall and social space. This formal armature of the circle allows each room of the spa - sauna, public bath, and guest house - to individually reflect its unique programmatic demands without detracting from the unifying identity of the project. Each space, simply detailed with native woods and exposed structure, fulfills the particular programmatic requirements of water, heat, light, privacy, and views. This circular space of ambulation marks the territory of the spa while still retaining the trace of the clearing in the forest, perpetuating the memory of Baltic vernacular architecture. With an ethos of minimal interference and simplicity, this hortus conclusus pursues a new type of ecotourism, one in which the spatial diagram of the spa enables a new environmental, cultural, and social agency.
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2nd Prize Winner
A House for Jānis
United Kingdom
Jury feedback summary
The success of the second place proposal for the Blue Clay Country Spa competition lies in its strong response to the site and its playful reinterpretation of vernacular form. The project consists of a primary linear structure: a thatched roof longhouse spanning from the forest edge to the lake and rooted in the traditional Kurzeme typology typical of the region. A second linear element - a strip of productive landscape containing gardens, outdoor dining, a pool, and other ecological services - intersects the longhouse at an angle and divides the site into disparate quadrants. Within the structure, a series of whimsical follies contain the program and the remaining space is effectively open to the outdoors, creating a blurred threshold between landscape and interior. This linear parti, combined with the calculated rhythm of enclosed elements, define an interior procession from the forest to the lake, while the porosity of the structure allows for visitors to filter into the landscape. The strength of the linear strategy is further emphasized by the scale of the traditional thatched roof, forming a long opaque bar against the backdrop of trees, isolating the separated landscape spaces and creating peaceful, intimate realms while allowing permeation through the building and its inner world.
3rd Prize Winner
Reflection in the Garden
United States
Jury feedback summary
The strength of the third place entry lies in its combination of three architecture typologies, the courtyard, pavilion, and promenade, to generate a spa experience that is simultaneously containing and exposing. The project employs a circular promenade to create a defined perimeter within an expansive, rural site. The rigid perimeter is strategically broken down by the program contained within, creating a surprisingly outwardly engaging experience. The interior program of the spa is organized around a central gathering courtyard. The courtyard extends and crosses the perimeter promenade to create and define the building entry. The major circulation corridors pinwheel off from the central courtyard extending past the promenade to the landscape breaking down the program into isolated structures. Each structure contains a key programmatic element that is separated as a pavilion within a carved out courtyard. The pavilions take on distinct architectural forms defining unique spatial experiences for the programs they house. The small pavilion courts directly engage the perimeter promenade focusing the user to the exterior of the site while inviting the wanderer to simultaneously look in. The project creates a closed loop of retrospection allowing the visitor to reflect outwardly to the landscape while inhabiting each individual spa space, simultaneously reflecting back inwardly while wandering the exterior promenade.
BB STUDENT AWARD
Boxes!
BB GREEN AWARD
Blue Clay Country Spa - Garden Spa
United Kingdom
Honorable Mentions
Shortlisted projects
REFLECTION RETREAT
United States Boxes!
Project ID 6567
NARCISSUS Project ID 6561
The long house
Spa for one family
casa azul
BY THE TREES
The Blue Clay Spa
Project ID 6481
Blue clay country spa in Latvia
Project ID 6472
The Big "O"
Project ID 6468_Blue Clay Country Spa
The Elemental Eco-Spa
The Clay Spa
GAMMA
Remedium
A room with a view
D.I.Y. COUNTRY SPA
Uncanny Valley
Saules zīme
Nature catcher
Funnel roof project ID 6256
The Room in the Garden
LATVIAN RETREAT - Project ID 6203
THE ESC
The Value of Nature
Framing nature
A natural approach
Alone Together
CO2HABITATION
Project ID 6151
Māla Trauki
HOUSE OF BLUE
The Blue Cline
Project ID 6089 - Blue Clay Country Spa Competition
Project ID 6088
Time’s Spa
HEALING STONE Blue Clay Country Spa
The Lake House
Blue Clay Country Spa
Project ID 6057
IN THE EARTH, ON THE WATER
Project ID 5985
AMARCORD - Blue Clay Country Spa
ORIGAMIC FOLDS
Blue Clay Wellness Village
BC-CS Kurzeme, Latvia
The Blue Clay Country Spa
Blue Clay Country Spa
Gaidīts Blue Clay
Three Chambers
THE VILLAGE
Welcome to Blue Clays
blue life
Project ID 5834
WHALE’S BELLY
Project ID 5832
A look to the woods and a look to the sky
BLUE CLAY COUNTRY SPA
COVE
BLACK HOUSE I GREEN HOUSE
Project ID 5786
Blue Clay Country Spa
Forest Greenhouse
Therapy Through Nature
BLU
