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A team from the University of Stuttgart led by Alexander Schwarz in collaboration with David Chipperfield Architects Berlin are one of three winners of the Piranesi Prix de Rome’s Imperial Forum competition. Organised by the Accademia Adrianea di Architettura e Archologia, the international ideas competition called for proposals that looked at the relationship between architecture and archaeology. The brief focussed on Rome’s central area, the Via dei Fori Imperiale which is situated between the Piazza Venezia and the Colosseum.

The design centres on the transformation of the 1930’s urban axis and the historic excavation area into a central park. Inspired by the tradition of the romantic landscape garden, the different archaeological layers are modulated into a continuous topography. Six new buildings, including a museum, a new main entrance to the Forum Romanum, a restaurant, a café and an underground antiquarium, are inserted into the landscape.