“What an architect does is to sell a vision”: Competition winner Jansen Che

“To me, architecture is inherently optimistic. It has the power to inspire, uplift, and connect people,” says Sydney-based award-winning architect Jansen Che, who was recently announced as one of three winners of the Norman Foster Foundation Kharkiv Freedom Square Revival design competition.

As an architect with over a decade of professional experience designing everything from home renovations and heritage projects to high-rise towers, Che sees the competition as an opportunity to contribute to the revival of Ukraine. Initiated by the Norman Foster Foundation along with the Kharkiv City Council as part of the larger concept masterplan for the city, the competition sought design proposals from local and international architects for the Regional Administration Building as well as the public realm of the adjacent Freedom Square.

Che, who also teaches at the University of New South Wales and is an assessor for the NSW Architects Registration Board, says the achievement is particularly meaningful because Norman Foster, someone who he has looked up to throughout his career, chaired the jury. 

Elaborating on the competition, he says that Kharkiv’s proximity to Ukraine’s border with Russia also meant that it was one of the first places to be affected by the ongoing conflict. As Ukraine’s second largest city, it's also considered to be a significant cultural, educational and industrial hub. With Kharkiv sustaining a fair bit of damage, the mayor saw this as an opportunity to rebuild the city. The site for the competition is located in the heart of the city and comprises of a very large plaza as well as the government building.
 

Designing for competitions
Che follows a three-step process when designing for competitions – research, idea generation and presentation. “It's never a linear process for me,” he explains. “I often jump back and forth between these steps, but I often spend a lot of time researching in the beginning. I spent the first few weeks trying to understand the brief – the very long and ambitious brief – and then researching precedents and analysing the competition site.” 

Che also looked into how some of the largest public squares around the world were designed, read about the masterplan, and watched lectures. Because he couldn't visit Ukraine, he explored the site on Google Street View, found websites dedicated to the history of Ukraine, studied old historic photos of the site, and watched a number of YouTube videos of Kharkiv’s streets and buildings uploaded by locals during the war.

Above: Jansen Che / Supplied
 

All these resources gave him a good sense of the space, the impressive scale, and more importantly, a feel of the atmosphere there that couldn't be read in the brief. 

For instance, the videos helped him understand the layout of the underground pedestrian network that connected the government building to the metro station. Incidentally, all the metro stations were retrofitted during the war to accommodate classrooms for kids so that they could study without worrying about being bombed. This inspired Che to design the belowground war memorial as part of his competition entry.

On the winning design and the jury’s response
As one of the largest squares in the world and surrounded by heritage buildings, Kharkiv’s Freedom Square has a very monumental scale to it. It has the ability to host all kinds of events from concerts and Christmas markets to hot air balloon launches. However, when it’s not hosting events, it's rather lifeless and underutilised, which, according to Che, was the main challenge for the competition.
 

                                Above: Jansen Che’s entry ‘Memory’ - Kharkiv Freedom Square

To activate the space, Che’s design frames the square with columns that mirror the exact proportions of the columns on the heritage facade of the Regional Administration Building, transforming the plaza into an extension of the iconic building, and reinforcing the connection between the two spaces. “It makes the square a little bit more intimate, and breaks down the space and defines the square a lot more,” he explains. 

Though the jury had reservations about the grid of columns, which they felt were reminiscent of authoritarian aesthetics, contrasting with the square’s identity as a space of freedom and democracy, they were appreciative about how Che’s design “preserves the square’s openness, maintaining its monumental scale while incorporating modern elements”.

The role of architects in society
“I think architecture is about improving the quality of life,” says Che, who believes design should be thoughtful, innovative and sustainable. “Ultimately, what an architect does is to sell a vision. We are visionaries, and that may be a vision for a bathroom renovation or a vision to plan the city. To me, architecture is inherently optimistic. It has the power to inspire, uplift, and connect people, and I think that was the purpose of this competition.”

While the war needs to end first before the masterplan can move forward, Che believes it’s commendable that the city is already preparing for the future. “That's how this competition came about. They see this as an opportunity to invest in the future. I think because they have this vision, it helps them stay resilient during these tough times.”

Main image: Jansen Che’s entry ‘Memory’ - Regional Administration Building / Supplied

Listen to our podcast with Jansen Che here.