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New constructions continue at Rike Park in Tbilisi, Georgia


The Bridge of Peace leading to Rike Park was a controversial construction due to its cost and unusual modern design.


At the base of a hill (up the steps to Avlabari), underneath the domed Presidential Palace, is Rike Park on the left bank of the Mt’k’vari River. A choreographed fountain spray comes to life at night as the coloured lights seem to make the water dance. Sculptures, large grand pianos, and flower beds are all slowing evolving in the park. The newly constructed cable car terminus by the Italian Leitner Group continues the glass-building theme of the Bridge of Peace and other constructions in Georgia. So too does the theatre currently under construction.


 While the Bridge of Peace looks like a marine gastropod mollusc, such as a cephalaspidean sea slug, and the cable car terminus looks like a lopsided glass box, the new music theatre/exhibition hall construction looks like a Cornetto ice cream cone.


  
Amid the old architecture of Tbilisi are modern glass constructions that elicit a range of responses, from ugly to innovative. However, Italian-born Massimiliano Fuksas is a multi-award winning designer and architect. His design for the Rike Park music theatre is certainly unusual and eye-catching.






MARTINA NICOLLS is an international aid and development consultant, and the author of:- The Shortness of Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet (2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).

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  1. UnknownOctober 30, 2013 at 8:27 PM

    Saakashvilis's Tbilisi is the exaple how one uncivilized madman can disfigure beautiful old town.

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