The project for the new governmental center for the Province of Bergamo is conceived to serve as a new landmark in the urban landscape, a gateway which opens to the city of Bergamo, and simultaneously towards the territory of the province it serves and represents.  It is not an inward looking artistic object, rather it is a new symbol of a city which is moving towards a communal future while remaining coherent to it’s historic traditions and to the new city of which it will become the centralizing element.

Our vision for this new complex, the new center of the province or Bergamo, is that of a light and porous one, as if it blends seamlessly in its environment, integrating with the sky without distinguishing itself against the existing city and context.

The proposal is developed following thematic strategies:  an emblematic icon which is nonetheless coherent with context, a ‘new naturality’, lightness and transparency, symbolic yet porous, flexibility and hierarchy of functions.

The project is an elegant hybrid of three distinct architectonic elements which combine to form an ’open-citadel’,  a cluster of thin elements which contradict the idea of an institutional enclave – rather than closing upon itself, it unfolds and opens onto its surroundings.

The project is composed of a stratified base, is articulated in separate levels. The ‘Garden’ level, composed of natural elements (flora, water, etc) which is open in every direction. The garden is connected to and is a continuation of the Lombard Landscape south of the new city center. Above this open public space is the ‘Cloud’ level, a centralized hinge element which connects and reconciles the two morphological grids of the city of Bergamo.   In addition, this ‘cloud’ serves to connect and mitigate the horizontal urban activity into the two new buildings of the Nuova Sede della Provincia di Bergamo.

The two vertical Elements, the ‘Tower’ and the ‘Slab’  comprise the symbolic and functional  elements of the complex.

The ‘Slab’ is conceived as a ‘machine for open civic organization and functions as the interface between the governmental  departments, civil services and the citizens of Bergamo.

The ‘Tower’, with its thin profile is the projects symbolic element, contains a curiously limited number of functions, mixing high level offices, breathtaking open volumes, winter gardens, observation decks and cultural and learning institutions.