Christoph Ingenhoven leads the competition for the International Criminal Court

The International Criminal Court (ICC) was founded in 2002 in accordance with the Rome Statute, an international treaty to which 105 countries are now signatories. The court prosecutes those accused of the most serious crimes of international concern: genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
An open anonymous competition for its permanent headquarters, on a prime site bordering the North Sea dunes, was produced a twenty-strong shortlist comprised entirely of leading international offices (from 171 initial entries).

The brief called for 1,200 workstations, courts, and ancillary facilities in a gross floor area of 46000 sq m.
Discussions continue between the ICC_and the three prize-winners, Christoph Ingenhoven, Wiel Arets and SHL/Bosch & Fjord, with a final winner to be announced in July.

Christoph Ingenhoven – first prize
‘The three main areas for the prosecutors, the judges and the registrars are clearly separated from each other, but still the building acts architecturally as an ‘open house’. Views into nature or one of the several omnipresent gardens orientate both everyday users as well as visitors in the building. The architecture is light, careful, elegant and transparent. It is detached from any specific cultural context. The design is not an overly defensive ‘security-architecture’ but an expression of fairness’.

Schmidt Hammer Lassen/Bosch & Fjord – second prize
‘Riding west on van Alkemadelaan, you will see the landscape suddenly open up and give way to a luminescent, sculptural composition of square towers. It emerges on a backdrop of remarkable rolling dunes and scenery of heath, and dry and wet grasslands’. The jury desribed the approach as ‘a very impressive and interesting architectural gesture and a great contribution to the city with an attractive integration into the landscape.’

Wiel Arets – third prize
‘A contemplative working environment creates the foundation for the more introverted courtrooms. Like precious gemstones set into jewellery… four vertically extruded, lit cones denote the rooms for hearings. The epicentre of the legal organization is formed amongst a sequence of other voids in the form of patios encased by workplaces. In plan the courtrooms become part of the overall spatial set-up, in section the cones display an iconographic silhouette.’

AT198/May 09 p19