It is the last lap. Special Art Zone, the first building which will be built in Kobro City is just a small step away from the building permit and financial guarantees. Every day, we are closer to building a modern art centre where today’s tracks finish on the Łódź Fabryczna railway station. This modern art centre and its vision go beyond the future.

Art is going to dominate the area of Kobro City and that is why Łódź decided to build the venue for the 21st century art that will combine exhibition, museum, educational and leisure functions. The contest for the project of the Special Art Zone was won on 5 July 2008 by the German consortium Möller Architekten + Ingenieure BDA, which proposed the art centre in the shape of a 240-meter glass tube filled with light. In the section of the building, a circle will be inscribed in a square, referring to the famous Vitruvian Man by Leonardo da Vinci. The transparent cylinder that looks a bit like a particle accelerator, a telescope or a kaleidoscope will stand right next to the Kobro Square, in the heart of Kobro City. The Special Art Zone will symbolize the combination of knowledge, imagination, and a dream, and it will become the point of focus of innovative, educational, creative, integrating activities, stimulating involvement in culture, which aim at creating the outlook on life which is open to the meanings of tomorrow and at the same time embodies memory about the past. Thanks to its latitudinal position, the Special Art Zone will also become the portal which will connect the East and the West. In this way, Łódź will again become ‘the gate of Europe’.

On 25 March, key events for the realisation of the project took place. ‘The architects Charly Möller and Jurgen Onderka, together with their Polish representative Janusz Filusch, handed us documents which consisted of the construction project comprising the description of all the technical installations of the building and e.g. a geological analysis,’ said Andrzej Falicz, the team manager for the Project of the Special Art Zone. ‘The project will be soon analysed by the special commission in which I participate together with the representatives of the Bureau for Realization and Supervision of Investments, the Department of Spatial Planning and Monument Protection as well as the Department of Architectonic and Building Administration. We have fourteen days to find possible gaps and request filling them. However, this is actually the last lap. I have a great hope that we will receive the final construction project and the building permit before the end of May. The detailed design should be ready at the beginning of the following year.

The concept of the glass tube turned into a huge project, consisting of several volumes of elaborations. What does the initial idea, which charmed us all with the clarity of form, look like after months of work of the team of architects? ‘The project itself is truly impressive visually, it even surpassed my expectations,’ says Andrzej Falicz. ‘It’s greatest value is transparency. However, the project has to flourish with life to warm up.’ Therefore, we have to wait until the building will really be erected to fully appreciate it. We can already look forward for this moment. On the same day, wonderful news from the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage arrived. During the meeting with Łukasz Magin, the vice-mayor of Łódź and Andrzej Walczak, mayor’s commissioner for the Special Art Zone, minister Bogdan Zdrojewski promised to support the project of the Special Art Zone with the amount of PLN 190 million from the EU funds. The only condition is that Łódź has to submit all the documentation in May. So far, the Special Art Zone has been the first on the list of reserve projects of the ‘Infrastructure and Environment’ operational program. The ministry grant guarantees a sum of about PLN 400 million for the realisation of the project. PLN 96 million was given previously by the City of Łódź Office and the Marshal’s Office of the Łódź Voivodeship.

Concrete actions connected with rebuilding the railway junction of Łódź seem to be decisive. According to minister Zdrojewski, granting the European Union’s funds depends on them. Now, the whole Poland knows that nothing will stop the changes that will be introduced in Łódź. We can say today that we have made another step towards this unique project which will give creative energy to the whole Łódź. Special Art Zone symbolizes the beginning of a new chapter in the history of the city which wishes to become the European Capital of Culture not only in 2016 but for many decades.