Foster & Partners founder met with city’s mayor to discuss future reconstruction plans
Norman Foster has set out plans to assemble the world’s “best minds” in architecture to design a reconstruction of the battle-scarred Ukrainian city of Kharkiv.
The Foster & Partners founder met with the city’s mayor Ihor Terekhov on Monday to discuss the future “rebirth” of the city’s buildings and infrastructure, much of which has been completely destroyed during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Kharkiv, located close to the Russian border, is Ukraine’s second largest city and was home to nearly two million people before the war. More than 1,900 buildings have been destroyed by bombing, according to Terekhov.
The city has been a key target during the invasion, which has refocused in recent weeks to Ukraine’s eastern regions following the Russian army’s retreat from the area surrounding Ukrainian capital Kyiv.
在会谈中，福斯特分享了他为重建哈尔科夫所准备的一份宣言，并承诺召集一个由世界领先的专家组成的团队，“立即”开始这一进程。
He said: “I undertake to assemble the best minds with the best planning, architectural, design, and engineering skills in the world to bear on the rebirth of the city of Kharkiv. In the spirit of combining a planetary awareness with local action, I would seek to bring together the top Ukrainian talents with worldwide expertise and advice.”
He added that the first step would be a city-wide masterplan which would “deliver the city of the future now and to plan for its life decades ahead.”
The project would combine the city’s most-loved and revered heritage buildings with the most “desirable and greenest” elements of infrastructure and buildings, Foster said, adding: “A masterplan is an act of confidence in the future for generations still to come.”
出席会议的还有牛津大学教授伊恩·戈尔丁、哈佛大学教授埃德·格莱泽和诺曼·福斯特基金会设计、建筑和技术部门的共同负责人迭戈·洛佩兹和阿尔贝托·森多亚，以及乌克兰议员伊戈尔·阿布拉莫维奇和奥尔加·德米扬年科。
The meeting was convened by Terekhov following discussions which began at the second UN Forum of Mayors in Geneva, which took place earlier this month and included a talk by Foster.
Foster also attended the first forum in October, giving theopening keynote speechon how the covid-19 pandemic provided an opportunity for mayors around the world to make cities more resilient to future emergencies including climate change.
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