The Thin House

Reykjavik has the exclusive opportunity to reinvent its city centre. It could not only rejuvenate itself but also give a preview of how a European city of the 21st century could function.Today is not usual to have the chance to plan a completely new activity centre for the city. Normally, this opportunity is just given in the big-box development: the shopping mall, where planners try to recreate the atmosphere and structure of inner cities. Shopping malls ultimately took over and claimed all centre functions for themselves, far away, and sealed off from the centre, but imitating the inner city. Reykjavik could herald a reverse trend. As the garden city was a reaction on industrialization, the Vatnsmýri development will be the reaction on the Diasporas of city-life.We bring to the centre of the new city the functions that have been placed in the suburbs of our cities: shopping malls, multicinemas, Ikea stores… and we create and underground level which will provide all the necessary parking places and infrastructure that these big programs required.