A new masterplan is designed for the whole park, including the development of a new restaurant.
The noteworthy architecture firm, Studio Farris Architects designs a new plan for the Antwerp Zoo, one of the oldest animal parks in the world, located in the center of Antwerp (Belgium), right next to the Antwerp central train station. It focuses on strengthening the link between city and nature, visitors and animals.
 

Description of project by Studio Farris Architects

Established in July 1843, the Antwerp Zoo is one of the oldest animal parks in the world. Since its founding it has been managed by the Royal Zoological Society of Antwerp.

Studio Farris Architects was appointed as design architect to provide a new identity to the place, through a solution that defines the new restaurant, aviary, apes- and buffalo- shelter at the Antwerp Zoo in March 2013, in cooperation with ELD partnership, Fondu Landscape Architects and Officium. 

The project was completed in June 2017. The main driving concept for designing this unconventional intervention was enhancing the visitor experience, and putting it at the center of a unique spatial narrative that leads from the city into wilderness.

The new restaurant, that accommodates 350 seats indoor and 400 outdoor, is located between the home of the great apes to the North and the buffalo’s habitat and aviary to the South. By means of extending the existing animal shelters on both sides, the project aims at establishing an intertwining relationship between visitors and animals: the walk-through aviary provides an unexpected experience that brings visitors closer to the birds, apes and buffalos in their natural habitat.  

The building that hosts the restaurant is apparently understated in its elevation, that defines a very ample window opening towards the inner space of the zoo. In plan, however, it reveals a more distinct character and a rather complex geometry is revealed that expresses the multiple relations and interconnections with the tensile lightweight structures built around it. To the North, the restaurant visually extends, through its large glazing, into a tensile lightweight structure that protects the outdoor park where the gorillas and chimpanzees can move around. The building touches the ground with massive columns creating a sort of cave that the primates use as a shelter. To the South, the savannah landscape sits 5 meters lower than the restaurant floor, allowing visitors to admire the buffalos and birds through large glass panes. Plants were selected that are indigenous to various places and will provide shelter and food to the birds. A special passageway runs under the restaurant building, connecting the primate shelter to the North with the buffalos’ and birds’ environment to the South and allowing glimpses of the surrounding habitat through a series of windows.

Completed in June 2017, the new facilities in the Antwerp Zoo have recorded increasing visitor numbers, the public being especially enthusiastic about their unusual zoo experience. Studio Farris and its consultants were able to effectively respond to the complex needs of the animals, visitors and commercial operations of the zoo.

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Architects
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Studio Farris Architects
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Collaborators
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Executive architect, engineering, mechanical - electrical - plumbing.- Eld (www.eld.be)
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Consultants
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Engineering for the aviary tensile structure.- Officium (www.officium.be)
and Eld (www.eld.be). Engineering for the apes’ tensile structure.- Close to bone (www.closetobone.be)
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Client
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KMDA - Koninklijke Maatschappij voor Dierenbescherming Antwerpen
(Royal Zoological Society of Antwerp)
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Contractor
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DEMOCO (www.democo.be)
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Dates
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Design.- 2013-2017. Completed.- June 2017
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Total project area.- 10.000 sqm. Restaurant surface area.- 3,476 sqm
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Studio Farris Architects is an architectural practice based in Antwerp, Belgium and founded by Italian architect Giuseppe Farris in 2008. The studio’s goal is to discover the intrinsic potential in every project, questioning the obvious, exploring the surroundings and cultural heritage. This always while looking for harmony between sustainability and innovation, functionality and experience, ratio and feeling. The building’s users play a fundamental role in the conception of the architecture.

Giuseppe Farris was born on November 11, 1972 in Cagliari, Italy. After attending secondary school, he got his master in architecture at the Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia (IUAV) in Venice.

In 2001 he moves to Belgium and from then he works on various projects in cooperation with Jo Crepaim. In 2008 he founds Giuseppe Farris Architects in Antwerp of which he is currently the managing director and lead architect. In 2009 he wins the competition for the refurbishment of the entrance hall of the Flemish Parliament in Brussels. After the completion in 2010, he was nominated for the Dutch Lai Award. The renovation of the city hall of Leuven, to host new spaces for Belgium’s public broadcasting company VRT, started in 2010 and was finished in 2012. In early 2015, he was nominated for the WAN 21 for21 Award (London), and shortly thereafter he won the Architizer A+ Award (New York) for the Park Tower.

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Published on: May 23, 2018
Cite: "New aviary and restaurant at the Antwerp Zoo by Studio Farris Architects" METALOCUS. Accessed
<https://www.metalocus.es/en/news/new-aviary-and-restaurant-antwerp-zoo-studio-farris-architects> ISSN 1139-6415
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