The jury was particularly drawn to the project’s ability to treat historical form with seriousness and humour simultaneously. Rather than merely restoring a historic composition, the design speculates on the sense of wonder and estrangement such landscapes may once have produced. The resulting intervention is at once monumental and slightly absurd, transforming inherited geometries into a contemporary landscape that remains capable of surprise and of hosting public life. The project is well aware of contemporary landscape requirements, the ideological regimes that produced it, and situates them within the found historic outline. It objectifies the extravagance of the 18th-century formalism in the present time, hinting at its novelty and radicality centuries ago. Through a careful interplay of historical references, contemporary insertions and intentional anachronisms, the project constructs a rich palimpsest in which different eras and value systems remain visibly present and interact with each other. It offers a productive critique of how strong visual language does not obstruct our common effort to adapt to challenges of today. At the same time, a large part of the park, as experienced from the pedestrian’s perspective, appears as a simple meadow landscape that offers programmatic and design features connected through a geometry that holds these temporal layers together in a daring and unusually witty juxtaposition. - from the award statements
