(Vienna, 22 January 2019) The winning project for building the new MedUni Campus Mariannengasse was on display in a public exhibition alongside all the other entries.
A lot of interested people came to the opening to view the project entered by the bidding consortium comprising Delugan Meissl Associated Architects and ArchitekturConsult. Their design was voted the winner by the jury of the EU-wide design competition.
The designs entered by the other competitors were also of great interest to visitors.
Volkan Talazoglu, MedUni Vienna's Vice Rector for Finance, was delighted by the number of high-quality entries: "I would like to thank everyone who entered the competition for the high quality of their projects. In the end, the concept that won is the one that will best meet our diverse needs"
Says Max Pammer, Director of the Universities Division of BIG, emphasising the importance of architectural design competitions:
"Complex and distinctive urban development projects such as the MedUni Campus Mariannengasse require innovative, effective and architecturally original solutions, which are also economical. BIG therefore uses the device of architectural competitions to obtain the broadest possible spectrum of high-quality work. Such competitions not only serve to develop national building culture but also to highlight new architectural directions that take account of societal trends. This is of particular interest to us when it comes to educational buildings, in the context of the "Educational space of the future" initiative. BIG has now had its own architectural advisory board for more than 10 years to advise on the choice and structure of the award procedure for larger urban development projects and to attend meetings of the jury – as was the case for MedUni Campus Mariannengasse!
Says Elsa Prochazka, Jury Chairman for the MCM competition: The location of the new MedUni Campus anticipates an international trend to move away from enclosed university campuses outside the town and, instead, to make them easily accessible right in the heart of the town, allowing them to become an established part of the neighbourhood through a process of "universityfication". To a certain extent, this relies on the cooperation of all decision-makers involved and it is not always easy to reconcile all the complex boundary conditions with future usage requirements to produce a result that is attractive to students, researchers and teachers and to the city as a whole by revitalising an entire district.
The new MedUni Campus Mariannengasse is due to open for the 2025/26 Winter semester.