British Centre Turkmenistan
Program | LEISURE |
Cultural and Administrative Centre | |
Scale | sqm |
Location | Ashgabat, Turkmenistan |
Stage | Design |
Client | UK Government |
Design Year | 2015 |
With the rise of the informational age, the built environment is becoming increasingly standardised. Buildings are becoming anonymous and cities are tending towards the generic. Yet nation building doesn’t have to lead to cultural assimilation. The new Oguz school would embrace Turkmen identity (the horse, the carpet, the book, the gas…) so as to develop and generate a contemporary Turkmen vernacular. The School would engage internationally renown architects and educators to bring cutting edge pedagogy. Rigorous teaching methodologies would drill into and mine all aspects of Turkmen society. In doing so specific local design influences would be extruded and applied to tourism, recreational, educational, agricultural and infrastructural projects sited in Turkmenistan. Turkmenistan must be applauded by taking it’s culture and politically conserving heritage as exemplified with The Ministry of Horses, The Ministry of Carpets… and manifest in recent buildings such as The National Library (expressed as a book), The Ministry of Gas shaped (expressed as a lighter). Sustainability would be promoted. This would allow buildings not only to be ‘Made In Turkmenistan’ but, more importantly, to be ‘Designed In Turkmenistan’.