A new vision for the city of Ventspils

A bright, copper-plated building greets everyone arriving in Ventspils from Riga, which reflects the municipality’s intention to create a building that stands as the city’s landmark.

The new Ventspils Science and Innovation Centre (VIZIUM) has been designed by a team of Lithuanians from Audrius Ambrasas Architects studio, including Audrius Ambrasas, Vilma Adomonytė, Jonas Motiejūnas, Viktorija Rimkutė and Justas Jankauskas. They were supported by their Latvian colleagues Jūris Poga and Astra Poga.

The 6,500 sqm Science and Innovation Centre is a fusion of landscape and architecture. Its architects aimed to make the building an inclusive space, one that is used from every angle and whose view changes as you drive or walk past it.

The building is embedded into a newly formed rising hill, while at the intersection of the two, people are encouraged to climb onto a roof terrace with an amphitheatre. Upon further ascent, visitors can enjoy the panorama of the city from the observation deck.

The building is split into two functional parts: the lower part is a science and education centre for children and young people, and the upper part houses an innovation centre for hi-tech institutions.

Inside the foyer, the 365 sqm floor is made of over 600 000 Murano glass tiles, depicting a map of the world, with the city of Ventspils in the centre.

Building architect Audrius Ambrasas tells us more about this science and innovation centre, which won the first prize for the best public building at the Latvian Building Awards 2021.

For the winning submission in 2016, your team’s motto was Kāpa, which translates to dune in Lithuanian. What was the inspiration behind the idea for this building? How has this motto been reflected in the exterior of the building? Have there been other variations of the motto and of the shape of the building?

We had all sorts of ideas, it’s almost a shame that we didn’t record them all. One of the important things to discuss is the area where we had to locate the building. The first thing is the River Venta, where the bridge crosses, as you come from Riga into the city. Once you cross the bridge, there is a roundabout that takes you into town. Right behind the roundabout, there is a large meadow, which is where the site is. In the conditions of the bid, the municipality marked a place on the main street/bridge axis for the landmark to be constructed.

To be honest, we had never visited Ventspils before entering the competition. We’ve only seen the area on Google Street View. The place is rather unremarkable: there is a petrol station next to it, another petrol station on the other side and a meadow. The meadow is situated in a pit, the traffic circle is built with the entrance to the bridge, and the bridge is raised some 3.5 metres, maybe even higher. We have tried all sorts of design options – a hanging or a flying building – but nothing worked well. The design brief also called for the building to consist of two parts: an innovation centre and a science centre. These could be separate or combined, but the key point was that the innovation centre had to be easily accessible so that it could be rented out, bringing in a steady income.

We tried doing things in all sorts of ways. Then, somehow, the traditional version emerged, in which a tower is built on an axis, and you look at it from the bridge. We had the idea of laying the tower down so that instead of the building blocking your view as you approach it, it seems as if it has moved to the side and the scenery is revealed in the distance. It was not my intention to have a wall that is staring back at you from the bridge. There had to be some sort of intrigue about the building. I also kept wanting to design a building that one can climb on.

In the area where the pit was, we decided to create a hill to raise the terrain. The result is a hill on one side of the building, which leads onto the roof of the building and the terrace. The terrain is flat on the other side where the main entrance is. The building volume is designed to be simple. We wanted to raise the higher part and make it an innovation centre and use the lower part as a science centre. As the science centre will be used to house exhibits, which change from time to time, it would be preferable for this part of the building to be on one level. The building ended up being utilitarian, rectangular, L-shaped, but during our conversations, we drew a line, which connected the lower and upper parts of the building and the terrain. Once that line appeared, everything fell into place and we wrapped up the design for the competition in a couple of weeks.

We didn’t start with the idea of a dune, but when we had to come up with a motto for the entry, we thought of our building as a part of the landscape, a sort of artificial dune. In Latvian, a dune is kāpa, a staircase is kāpnes, to climb is kāpt, whereas one can also climb on our building, so we figured it was all interconnected.

The terrain of Ventspils is flat across the whole of its coastal area. We were not aware of it, but there is an artificial hill by the sea as you drive in from Lithuania. The hill is mounded, rather tall, and used as a ski slope. They call it the Lemberg’s Hat. Lemberg is the long-standing mayor of Ventspils. It just so happens that we have unintentionally continued the theme of that hill without even noticing.

The task was to design a landmark, a building that marks a city. What exactly is landmark architecture? What characterises it? Not all buildings are landmarks in architecture, but maybe not all of them should be?

If you set yourself up with the task of designing a landmark building for the city, you may not necessarily succeed. I think that a building may or may not become a city’s landmark. It’s hard to say what that depends on.

Still, the important elements are not just the visible ones, but rather the ones that are experienced in person, in which you sense the interrelation of things or objects, the contrasts of shapes, and the textures of materials. Making sure that a new building creates a space around itself is essential. For this reason, when designing our building in Ventspils, we designed two spaces: a lower one for the entrance and a higher one for the terrace. These areas create a space that is unique to the building. The functionality of the building is equally important for people to feel comfortable in the building, and to be able to walk around or step on the building.

It was really at the opening of the Vizium building that I observed that unless people came to see the building in person, climbed on it, or touched it, they couldn’t fully grasp the concept of it, even though there was a model of the building made. For instance, the mayor of the city exclaimed, “I can now finally see that when you come from the bridge, the slope of the hill meets the slope of the building!”. Funny, given that throughout the whole process he kept suggesting that the hill should be modified, planted, or used for terraces. But when he went up on the terrace his reaction was: “Oh, look how nice it is, you can see the city panorama and climb on the top”. I kept telling him that from the very beginning, our intention was to create this terrace with this view.

The shape of the building is secondary. Ultimately, people either like it or they don’t.

Creating a landmark is the same as writing a winning song for Eurovision. The songwriters know how to create the song, but the audience doesn’t like it.

Your studio’s website states that architecture is a puzzle. What was the most challenging piece of the puzzle in designing this building? What new concepts have you learned with this building?

The whole building becomes a puzzle. In designing a building, one has a brief that specifies what must be in or near the building. The context of the building is already set, and our task is to work with it. So, you try all sorts of options until you reach an epiphany on how to arrange it, and the puzzle is solved. The main consideration is for the building to have a beautiful shape and purpose. Seeking this beauty is where the puzzle is solved. If it fails, then others start to question the building, taking it apart, piece by piece, saying: ‘Pull it over there, pull it over here, push this or that way’.

Perhaps beauty is more persuasive than any functional solution. Even when it comes to money. Occasionally, this means that customers are willing to spend more money on beauty. In a different project, the person in charge of the construction described how he persuades clients to spend more money. He tells them, “Don’t worry, it’s just money”.

But creating beauty that is universally appreciated is difficult, just like writing that winning Eurovision song. There are times when you design a building and rejoice at how beautifully you did it, but others don’t share that sentiment, thinking it’s ugly, or at least not emotionally captivating.

During the construction of the building in Ventspils, construction workers had cameras in front of the building. Occasionally, I would look through the footage. I noticed that at the point where the slope of the higher part of the building starts, the sun starts to go down around midday and the whole trajectory of the sun is visible. The sun sets and descends almost directly at the point where the building and our newly formed hill come together. We had not foreseen the effect of the sun on the building. In fact, if you construct a building on the axis of the main road, regardless of its shape, looking at it from the bridge, the whole façade of the building is in shadow, and the sun appears behind it. Coincidentally, instead of a building on the main axis of the street, we ended up with the sun. When viewed from the bridge, our building seems to frame the sun’s descent and reveals the distant view behind it. The beautiful view was a lucky coincidence.

Ten years ago, the idea of inspiring children and young people to develop an interest in science and technology was born and today it has grown into the only innovation and science centre in the Baltic States – Vizium. Ventspils city council has been very consistent and ambitious in its efforts to create a unique building in the city. The project was completed three months ahead of schedule, contrary to what is usually the case. What was your experience working with the municipality? In what ways is working with Latvians different?

Our experience of the construction process in Latvia suggests that they have a considerably more advanced engineering culture. The landscape and well-being are also very important. The landscape part of the project probably took the longest time. They were concerned about the plants, the kerbs, and the pavements. The entire city council used to get together and decide the design of these elements. There were no issues with the level of precision in the execution. The stone kerbs are rounded, well aligned, and everything is done to a high standard. In Ventspils, for example, benches without backboards are not permitted, because they are uncomfortable for the public. Their benches are expensive, at least 3000 euros. The construction of the building is also more expensive, and they pay more attention to the quality of the work.

They are devoted fans of their city. We’d receive comments saying that they’re not interested in what is done in Riga, here in Ventspils they’ll do it better than anywhere else. Although Ventspils is not a big city, there is a sense of urban culture. The city has changed dramatically with the arrival of the current mayor, Aivars Lembergs, and the city’s chief architect, Daiga Dzeduone. Today, it has changed drastically: it has become cleaner and more oriented towards young families with children. A city with a vision, even though I personally don’t find the city attractive. Perhaps that is because historically it is less endearing. We usually stayed overnight in Kuldīga when we went to the construction site. There, we would get up in the morning and have a coffee in the town square and drive sixty kilometres to get to work.

How did you come up with the name of the building – Vizium?

The story of how the name Vizium was coined is very long. It took practically as long to design the building as it took to think of the name. There were all kinds of options. The boss liked the word Neo and therefore it was decided that the building would be called Neo. As it turned out, there was a company registered in Latvia under the same name and the search process had to start again. There was a point when they wanted to call it a science ship, but I insisted against it. We had come up with a working name for the building – Vince (Ventspils Innovation Centre), but we weren’t quite satisfied with it, and neither was anyone else.

Various competitions and surveys were held, and even the students were involved in the naming process. Vizium was suggested by a local resident. The name shall be encrypted: V(entspils) I(novāciju) (un) ZI(nātnes) (centr)UM. But the boss – the mayor of the city – did not like it. However, we and the city’s chief architect liked it very much. I told them, your city has a strong vision! After many discussions, we finally convinced the mayor that we should call it VIZIUM.

Text author: Vita Soltonaitė-Puslienė
Photos: Norbert Tukaj