Det­ta­glio del pro­get­to ed. 2020

B+B MŰTE­REM – RECON­STRUC­TION OF THE THE SAINT MAR­TIN PARISH

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Descri­zio­ne del progetto

Homa­ge to socia­li­st modernism
Monu­ment to an era
A pro­mi­nent archi­tec­tu­ral monu­ment dating back to the not so remo­te past of Hun­ga­rian socia­li­sm stands on one of the busie­st tho­rou­gh­fa­res of Buda­pe­st. Its desi­gner, Ist­ván Sza­bó, beca­me a cul­tic church-bui­l­­der of the era at the end of his vastly pro­duc­ti­ve archi­tec­tu­ral career spent in the ser­vi­ce of the dic­ta­tor­ship, when alrea­dy a pen­sio­ner and asking no remu­ne­ra­tion for his work. His fir­st church, which even­tual­ly func­tio­ned as a star­ting point for the com­pro­mi­se con­clu­ded bet­ween the Vati­can and the Kádár regi­me, recei­ved the bles­sing of Pope Paul VI.
The Saint Mar­tin parish church was the last pro­ject of his oeu­vre. It was built in 1985 in the sty­le Cen­tral Euro­pean histo­rians of archi­tec­tu­re now refer to as socia­li­st moder­ni­sm. During the thir­ty years after its con­struc­tion, the envi­rons of the church under­went radi­cal chan­ges defi­ned by three main fac­tors: (i) the quar­ter once inha­bi­ted by the socia­li­st wor­king class disap­pea­red, whi­le the fac­to­ries and the indu­strial plan­ts were repla­ced by gene­ric, late-post­­mo­­dern offi­ce buil­dings; (ii) the buil­ding itself dete­rio­ra­ted due to wear and tear and its tech­no­lo­gi­cal solu­tions grew obso­le­te par­tly as a con­se­quen­ce of the eco­no­mi­sing prac­ti­ce impo­sed upon the indu­stry by the shor­ta­ge eco­no­my and par­tly becau­se of the gene­ral­ly poor work mora­le that domi­na­ted the buil­ding sec­tor of the time; (iii) last but not lea­st, the alte­red role of the Catho­lic Church also played a part. After the chan­ges of 1989, the reli­gious per­se­cu­tion that had pre­vai­led in Hun­ga­ry during socia­li­sm was fol­lo­wed by a socie­tal and poli­ti­cal resto­ra­tion. The­se rea­sons toge­ther even­tual­ly led to the deci­sion made in 2014 about the recon­struc­tion of the parish church.
The pro­ject pro­vi­ded the archi­tec­ts with the oppor­tu­ni­ty to recon­si­der the func­tions of the buil­ding and to rede­fi­ne its dia­lo­gue with its sur­roun­dings. They set two major objec­ti­ves: (i) fir­stly, they wished to crea­te a trans­pa­rent com­mu­ni­ca­tion in the inte­rior of the buil­ding, so to this effect they ter­mi­na­ted the exte­rior stair­ca­se that was unfit for use by the elder­ly and the phy­si­cal­ly disa­bled. The new entran­ce was moved to the ground floor, whi­le the adjoi­ning vesti­bu­le was desi­gned to func­tion as a star­ting point for impres­si­ve­ly com­plex spa­ces: the com­mu­nal area ideal among others for wed­dings opens from here, just like the new­ly built stair­ca­se that leads to the upper level of the church inte­rior. Beyond the func­tio­nal and tech­no­lo­gi­cal moder­ni­sa­tion, the other goal was (ii) to clean­se the church, which they approa­ched as a kind of ’urban found object’, from the depo­si­ted ele­men­ts that were gra­dual­ly added to it con­tra­ry to the ori­gi­nal desi­gn con­cept. In order to rea­li­se this, the bell-gable on the west ele­va­tion was demo­li­shed, the buil­ding was strip­ped of the redun­dant cano­pies, and the func­tion­less ope­nings were wal­led up.
The expan­sion of the church buil­ding can be best like­ned to pre­ci­sion sur­ge­ry. As the regu­la­tions allo­wed rather limi­ted room for manoeu­vre, the new func­tions were ‘pac­ked into’ a mere­ly two-metre block with a highly com­plex spa­tial struc­tu­re. Thanks to the wall-like com­ple­men­ta­tion of the church’s sculp­tu­ral volu­me and the demo­li­tion of the old exte­rior stair­ca­se, the buil­ding regai­ned its ori­gi­nal cry­stal­li­ne monu­men­ta­li­ty that it had lost in the tight embra­ce of the sub­se­quen­tly con­struc­ted offi­ce buil­dings around it. This cor­ner­sto­ne aspect of the desi­gn is fur­ther enhan­ced by the inte­gra­tion of the for­mer­ly free­stan­ding cru­ci­fix into the body of the church.
The archi­tec­ts did not want to dra­sti­cal­ly alter the church inte­rior but they made three signi­fi­cant addi­tions: (i) they com­ple­ted the altar, (ii) they erec­ted a new cha­pel in lieu of the old entran­ce, (iii) and instal­led a fal­se cei­ling system remi­ni­scent of the roof struc­tu­re inclu­ded in the ori­gi­nal archi­tec­tu­ral plans but never actual­ly implemented.
The church was unvei­led in autumn 2017 and was bles­sed by Car­di­nal Péter Erdő, who is Arch­bi­shop of Esz­­te­r­­gom-Buda­­pe­­st and Pri­ma­te of Hun­ga­ry. The cere­mo­nial ope­ning was also atten­ded by Orso­lya Sza­bó, the daughter of the building’s ori­gi­nal desi­gner, who acti­ve­ly par­ti­ci­pa­ted in the pro­ject, hel­ping the team to evo­ke the spi­rit of Ist­ván Sza­bó, whi­le sati­sfy­ing con­tem­po­ra­ry expectations.
Prof. Dr. Andor Wes­­se­­lé­­nyi-Garay PhD., habil.
dipl. Arch., dipl. Urban Designer
The archi­tec­ts recei­ved the Pro Archi­tec­tu­ra award for desi­gn in 2018 and in the same year the buil­ding won the Hou­se of the Year award in the public buil­ding category.

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