Crematorium in Kedainiai
This is the first crematorium in Lithuania. The idea to build a crematorium was born in the interwar period, but at that time only furnace to reduce medical waste in Kaunas hospital was built. Increasing cremation traditions Lithunians use cremation services in Latvia and Poland. Building site- industrial town K?dainiai with 31000 inhabitants in the center of Lithuania. The area for the building was chosen in industrial park. New building is surrounded by a chaotic, unaesthetical industry: sugar mills, fertilizer factories with smoky chimneys. So the surroundings dont even have a smell of sacred place.
Unaesthetical industrial environment provoked to create minimalistic and even ascetic scenario. It is one storey concrete building which external and internal quality and unity was created with concrete surfaces. In order to distance itself from the industrial environment the building was designed closed like a human introvert. The main goal of the script- to create the inner Japanese style courtyard with a growing pendulum elm before the main entrance. Yard creates an intimate space, the accumulation zone before entering the building. Being inside the yard visually expands the space. It creates like an emotional filter to reduce humans experience of stress.