The work entitled Green Gate Project was designed by two young architects from Silesia region in Poland: Weronika Kiersztejn and Michal Kozik. Both of them were just completing their graduate studies in 2011. This was already the second big success of this team: in 2010 they won first prize in International Biennale of Interior Architecture in Krakow. To invite such young people to such serious competition as the Outdoor Gallery is, was a brave decision of its jury. After the anonymous voting, the jury were happy to recognize, that this wais the very team who won the third prize in that year’s competition.
“Green Gate” is a multi-layered project. Its visual actions refer to two different perceptual distances of the world: local and global. A local distance is direct being in and seeing an urban interior. Here the designers are using contemporary architectural language using a layer of green plants to build the balustrade of the bridge which links the Lower Town with the Old Suburbs district. In consequence, the interior of the urban canal, which is already partly green, receives consistency if a city park. The concept of Green Gate (the name is already used for a historical bridge in the town, yet the name is not referring to nature and its plants) receives a new, contemporary meaning. The second distance is the global Google network, which makes the image of every part of the globe accessible via the Internet to the entire world. The bridge’s floor is covered by a particular pattern-mosaic, which, besides its aesthetical value, is a QR code (more advanced version of a barcode). QR code imprinted into the bridge’s floor can be scanned by everyone, who will spot the bridge of the Lower Town. Through the scan, he/she will receive an access to a webpage, which describes the green architecture concept for the Lower Town. This double construction of the project is simultaneously local and global. It shows the desire of young architects to be sure, that the city which aspires to the world will not lose its local uniqueness; that such local uniqueness will be the road to participation in the world.