Roads Ministry Building

Quite an astonishing building!
GeoAIR had an exhibition there last year “Frozen Moments, Architecture Speaks Back”.
Designed in the 1970s by George Chakhava, who was both the lead architect and the client for the project, the building pioneered the ‘Space City’ method, whereby the building uses as little ground as possible, instead extending up into the air and allowing the landscape to flourish around the building. The concept was conceived from forest structures, where the trunks of trees have a relatively small footprint, but a large crown. As can clearly be seen in the above photo, nature has been encouraged to exist harmoniously alongside the building, showing an element of eco-awareness rare for the time it was built.

Amidst all the greenery, however, the architecture itself relies on fairfaced concrete and sharp geometrics – a space age look that combines aspect of Brutalism and Structuralism. Resembling a game of Jenga, the Tbilisi Roads Ministry Building has five horizontal parts, each with two storeys, resting on three cores, and resides on a steep hill next to the Kura River. As a result, the highest core is 18 storeys tall and the building can be accessed from either end. The building is considered an antithesis of American skyscrapers with its division of horizontal work spaces and vertical cores that contain the building’s stairs and lifts, effectively reinforcing the divide between East and West in a simple act of architecture. Now the property of the Bank of Georgia and currently subject to renovation, the structure was made into a National Monument in 2007.

This photo only, courtesy of Donovan Driver, text from the blog: origindesignstudio.co.uk
Another interesting article about the Roads ministry builidng has been published in this architectural research magazine: core.form.ula.com