Emmanuel Lévinas Centre of Philosophy

The Emmanuel Lévinas Centre of Philosophy is a mixed-use public building acting as a meeting place to strengthen the social fabric and democracy in the city of Kaunas. Apart from creating a timeless envelope around a long-lasting structure, the project ventured into exploring current issues regarding the meaningful utilisation of design technology.

This led me to write a multi-focused thesis: we design sitting in front of computers, to examine designs in real time in a near-realistic way. Does all this help, or would we make progress if we worked at a higher level of abstraction? This is a question to discuss in professional context, but as architects we inevitably have to face up to the impact of the built environment on nature. The energy consumption of buildings is dramatically affected by the choice of materials and their physical properties. Assessing this before construction is as much a moral imperative as fine-tuning the form, light and properties that affect our senses.\nThe representative spaces require the high ceiling height, which allows the lower height spaces (WC & HVAC) to be arranged one above the other in the central core, providing vertical circulation between the archive and library on one side and the wet rooms and building services on the other. \nDesign for disassembly: Buildings that can be disassembled and dismantled at the end of their life cycle are becoming increasingly important in the slowly evolving construction palette due to climate change. \nPrefabrication, modularisation: While it may not be obvious, the primary intent of space organisation and façade design is to minimise the number of building components used and installed. Repetition as an architectural tool goes hand in hand with prefabrication.\nStructure: The building is of mixed construction thanks to its Lithuanian woodworking background: a prefabricated timber pillar frame is built around a monolithic reinforced concrete service core. The laminated-glued beams and columns support cross-laminated slabs. The wall bays will have wood-framed, cellulose-filled sandwich panels.\nMaterials: The interiors contrast raw finishes and natural materials. The character of the polished concrete or terazzo floors and the exposed surfaces of the RC core on all levels is softened by wooden elements. The use of copper is preferred on furniture edge finishes, door handles and other commonly used metal surfaces, for its oligodynamic effect in addition to its classic tone.