Educational Community Center for children

Authors’ Comment

The Rahova neighborhood illustrates a layering of urban contrasts: between the historical fabric and recent urban interventions, between vernacular subdivisions and collective housing developments. These contrasts generate both evident vulnerabilities and significant potential for regeneration. Currently, economic and social pressures expose issues such as the lack of coherent public spaces, the degradation of green areas, and the absence of functions that support community life.
The diploma project proposes the reactivation of a residual space through the creation of an educational community center for children, with the aim of transforming it into a nucleus for socialization, learning, and interaction. This type of urban intervention seeks to restore weakened social ties by generating public spaces tailored to the community's needs. A key component of the intervention is the network of outdoor spaces: inner courtyards, green areas, playgrounds, and relaxation zones. These are designed as natural extensions of the educational center, but also as open, accessible social infrastructure. They serve as a framework for community life, helping to rebuild a sense of belonging and strengthen the bonds among residents.
The center's volume is not conceived as an isolated object, but rather as one that seeks to establish visual and functional relationships with the surrounding environment. The ground floor is activated to encourage proximity and interaction. This creates a conducive environment for various activities, ranging from formal education and play to informal gatherings, extracurricular programs, and community workshops. The center is structured around essential functions that support different forms of learning, expression, and development. Spaces dedicated to quiet activities—such as flexible classrooms and the library—are designed for formal learning, focus, and individual or collaborative study. These offer an adaptable setting, encouraging critical thinking and autonomy. The area dedicated to dynamic and creative activities includes specialized workshops that provide concrete contexts for experiential learning, manual work, and artistic expression. These spaces develop practical skills, stimulate creativity, and support interdisciplinary learning.
Support functions—such as the cafeteria, kitchen, medical and psychological offices, locker rooms, and administrative areas—ensure a healthy, safe, and efficient operation of the center. Hallways are envisioned as extroverted, lively areas for encounters and exhibitions.
The volumetric approach is rooted in a complex urban situation, where the site lies at the intersection of two types of urban fabric: on one side, the traditional fabric with discontinuous frontages, small scales, and a fragmented, dynamic image; on the other, the continuous frontage of collective housing, with a larger scale and a clear street alignment. This discontinuity in frontages, heights, and setbacks becomes the starting point for the volumetric concept. The proposed volume not only transitions between the two height regimes but also incorporates the variation specific to the traditional fabric, generating a composition of distinct volumes that differ in function and character.
The site layout proposes a pedestrian passage connecting two opposite streets, creating an active route that energizes the urban block and links the two ends of the urban perspective.