Olga Harea

Global trends in the revaluation of wine culture and the importance of viticultural landscapes have led to a new era of wine architecture which celebrates its relationship with the landscape; a new era where the philosophy of considerateness and ‘fit into the character of the landscape’ or “adaptation to the existing landscape” has top priority. The main focus of our research is to analyse if this new trend – “the quest for integration of architecture into the landscape” – is valid in each case. To perform this study, three recently built examples of remarkable wine architecture were selected; these are owned by prominent entrepreneurs and designed by three world-famous designers and located in the same, valuable and protected viticultural landscape. The research goal is to discover how the professional, highly commended architects faced this challenge. Did they intend to subordinate the wineries within the landscape or did they intend to make a contrast and mark the territory in order to represent their personal artistic style as a brand? Did they treat the surrounding viticultural landscape as inspiration for their architectural concepts or as a background? Are these new wineries a part of the surrounding landscape or are these distinct and separate objects from it?

The contemporary wine architecture built in the sacral landscape, their interaction and philosophy are the particular focus of this paper. The paper presents two recently completed winery complexes in Hungary, the Bazaltbor Winery (2010) and the St. Ilona Winery (2013). Both of them are built at the foot of the volcanic hills (Badacsony, Somló), which “witness” the reunion of man and nature through over two thousand years of wine culture. The research goal is to discover the architects’ and landscape architects’ intentions, how did they face the challenge? Did they subordinate the winery to the landscape, did they copy the shape of the natural landscape, did they hide the building under the earth or did they re-interpret the whole situation? Did they react to the sacrality of the place?