aerial photo: Jaka Ivančič
group photo: Rok Nagode

As a group of landscape architects from Studio AKKA and architects from studio void arhitektura we have been awarded this year’s Plečnik Award for the Ankaran Cemetery on May 19, 2025.

The jury, composed of Ilka Čerpes, chair, Nika Grabar, Jerneja Fischer Knap, Urška Kranjc in Saša Begović, justified its decision by saying:

“The design of the cemetery sets squarely into the slope of the forest’s edge and coheres the experience of the site with the awarenes of the landscape on a broader scale. The architects bridge the difference in altitute of the exceptionally demanding  site with inclines, which visually connect the visitor with the horizon and the various forest ambients. The articulation of the contiguous burial area into several segments so as to allow the separate burial sites to be engrossed into the surrounding woods creates the opportunity to interweave the forest landscape with the grave sites, which subtly activates the potential of the public space and simultaneously protects it while the users are presented with a park layout which transcends the programme and the space of the cemetery.”