Building of the Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Lithuania

About object:

The building has been designed in the historic place in the old town near the Dominican monastery and the ensemble of the Jesuit novitiate, on the outline of Gothic buildings of the XIV – XV centuries uncovered during archaeological research. The design and construction process lasted from 1977 to 1997 due to several stages of archaeological research carried out changes in the building use.
In exterior solutions the architect “encoded” the historical development of that block: the composition of St. Ignatius street facades replicated the silhouette of former four- Gothic building volumes and the fence used to connect them.
The complex consists of groups of premises grouped around a courtyard: administrative offices, a conference room, lounges, cafe and cellar, where valuable brick remains of Gothic buildings are exposed. The main focus of the interior is decoration of lounge and corridor walls including gray dolomite bands and playful graphics of ceramic floor decoration (its authors are architects Elena Nijolė Bučiūtė, Lada Markejevaitė, Alma Palekienė).
Expression of building does not intend to accurately reproduce or imitate forms and styles of former historical buildings. Retrospection here has been expressed through contemporary postmodern architectural language, semantic clues, contextual scale and conveyance of composition rhythm.

D. Linartas