Forum Prager Strasse, Dresden

The Forum is a new shopping centre in the heart of Dresden. The Prager Strasse was developed between 1965 and 1978 as a grand boulevard in the socialist vein with three hotels,apartments, department stores, and a cinema. As the major connection between the remnants of the historical Altstadt and the monumental Hauptbahnhof, this broad pedestrian street is pivotal to Dresden's urban renewal process.

In such a central location, the Forum fills one of the last remaining gaps along the reprofiled route between the railway station area and the city's heart. The department stores frame a passageway that, being set at right angles to the shopping boulevard, is also a traverse that connects with the avenues encircling the city centre. The design of the elevations is robust and unambiguous, with pillars of natural stone and windows that are playfully angled. This is reminiscent of the classic German department store emerging around 1900 and the grandeur of historic Dresden, but simultaneously alludes to today's consumer society.

Based on the winning design for a more ambitious competition held in 2006, de Architekten Cie. was commissioned to create the facades of this complex.