Paradigma Ariadné is a Budapest-based architectural studio that designs extraordinary buildings, installations, and objects. Their designs meet all expected requirements and always include something extra, resulting in a more joyful daily life or a more pleasant environment for the inhabitants or users of the given building or interior space. This is why the office is characterized by an innovative approach to aesthetics, the pursuit of beauty, and the creation of buildings that have a story to tell. The office was founded by Attila Róbert Csóka, Szabolcs Molnár, and Dávid Smiló in 2016.
The office's partners and clients include institutions, corporations, municipalities, and individuals, particularly those seeking innovative ideas and solutions for their architectural tasks or projects that require architectural expertise. Accordingly, the office provides architectural design, editorial, curatorial, and educational services.
Paradigma Ariadné, together with art historian Dániel Kovács, curated the Hungarian Pavilion at La Biennale di Venezia 2021, and the office has showcased its work in several exhibitions and international collaborations in Budapest, Venice, Warsaw, Vienna, Ljubljana, Logroño, Dortmund, Milan, Paris, and Ohio in the United States.
Project description in English
Boglands are complex wetland ecosystems with intricate living environments and soils, making them more fragile than swamps or marshes. Historically, Budapest was surrounded by boglands due to the Danube River, but centuries of drainage have left only a few hectares remaining. One untouched bogland exists between a large shopping center and the M0 highway in Budapest's suburbs, providing a sanctuary for numerous species, including 50 of Hungary's 265 bird species.
NHOOD Services Hungary Ltd., which manages this land, decided to develop an educational trail to showcase the bogland's richness and significance to a broader audience. They held a tender for the trail's architectural design and construction, which we won in 2022. After a year and a half, the trail is now open to the public, featuring four pavilions and an 850-meter-long path that educates visitors about the bogland.
We designed the trail using a single specific shape for the four pavilions, a generic stepped structure that serves multiple purposes: an exhibition space with infographics on the bogland's geological history, a place to experience the soil's physical qualities, a lookout point, and a climbing structure for children. These structures intentionally avoid resembling typical architectural elements and instead highlight their artificial nature, underscoring their role as intruders in the natural environment.
The blue pavilions, visible from a distance, appear artificial and unfamiliar in function at first glance. This design choice aims to create a sacred environment that, combined with educational content, provides visitors with a profound emotional and intellectual experience. The structures' significant blue color, rare in nature, further emphasizes the human touch, making it clear that they are man-made.
The pavilions' timber frameworks will allow plants to grow over them in the coming years, blending them into the natural surroundings while maintaining their distinct presence. This concept draws inspiration from René Magritte's painting "The Blank Signature," where a woman's figure on a horse fades surrealistically among trees, mirroring our goal of both hiding and highlighting the structures within the natural environment.
Constructing the trail and pavilions on marshland posed significant challenges. The trail consists of short bridges, each six meters long, minimizing the number of ground screws needed. Ultimately, we used 240 ground screws, each driven six meters deep to rea
