Nine designs were presented and put up for discussion by the City of Leipzig in the fall of 2023 in a public participation process carried out with DIPAS, the Online-Schauplatz. One step of many in an extensive process to develop the currently largely unused inner-city Matthäikirchhof Leipzig site. In the coming years, a lively, urban quarter and a place for living democracy is to be created there.
The winning design was announced in February 2024: The choice fell on the Stuttgart office of Riehle Koeth GmbH & Co. KG in collaboration with Levin Mosigny Landschaftsarchitekten from Berlin.
All submitted works were subsequently on public display in an exhibition at the Leipzig City Office – including a VR application with the winning design, which was created in collaboration with the CUT cities of Hamburg and Leipzig.
The winning design
About the participation process
From April 2021 to the beginning of 2022, several public participation formats were implemented in an initial phase, in which Leipzig’s urban society co-creatively defined the character and development goals for the area in specialist workshops, among other things. The results were recorded in the Matthäikirchhof Code and presented at the Matthäikirchhof Forum on May 12, 2022.
With the Matthäikirchhof Code as the basis for the brief, the urban design competition was launched on May 2, 2023. The open urban design competition was concluded with a 1st jury meeting, where nine designs were selected from 66 anonymous entries. The decision was made by a jury made up of experts and political representatives as well as members of the urban community who had already been intensively involved in the first participation phase.
The nine designs were then presented to the public in the online showcase and at an in-person event, the Hofschau, which gave citizens the opportunity to view the shortlist in the 3D model, compare the designs, provide feedback and discuss them with others.
In the subsequent in-depth part of the competition, in November and December 2023, the planning teams were able to revise their designs once again and also take the public’s feedback into account. The second jury meeting took place in January 2024, at which the winning design was chosen.
The participation process for the development of the Matthäikirchhof shows how the multi-stage participation of urban society can succeed in the redesign of inner-city districts. From co-creative specialist workshops, digital surveys and commentary to analogue dialog events with digital support (including a 3D city model), citizens were able to get involved in the concrete implementation of their previously formulated ideas and wishes, regardless of time and place, and thus help shape the future of their city.
