Boccia Training Center
"The Beauty of Perfectly Imperfect"
Boccia is one of the sports that Thai athletes have been excelling at Paralympic Games and bringing back medals to their home country through the years. National Boccia Training Center under The Cerebral Palsy Sports Association of Thailand is designed and constructed to provide all the needed facilities for the most efficient and convenient training experiences for the country’s para athletes.
‘The beauty of perfectly imperfect’ lays the ground as the project’s design concept with the use of scalene triangle as the fundamental element of the design. Created are unique-looking architecture with facade, elevations with wonderful dimensions of light and shadow of the interior and exterior spaces, altering at different times of day. The architecture celebrates the beauty that originates from imperfection, just like Boccia athletes who strive and attain their beautiful achievements despite the imperfect start.
The design concept emphasizes on the access of the main users— the disabled people who use wheelchairs. The most important feature of the architectural design is the ramps and facilities specifically designed to accommodate and encourage positive behaviors of persons with disabilities. Through trainings, these individuals learn to prepare themselves and develop their life skills that will help assist their livelihood in the outside world.
The ramps become the key feature of the buildings and are placed in the most eye-catching position. Designed to have beautiful proportions, convenience level of inclination for users’ comfortable and enjoyable usage, the ramps serve as a symbol that reflects the identity of this specially designed space that hopes to improve every user’s quality of life, pride and sense of belonging.
The building reflects the imperfect aspect of beauty through a presentation of architectural design with universality, consequentially creating positive impression of the sports among potential users as well as the public.
In the big picture, Boccia Training Center wishes to become a space that nurtures Thai para athletes and encourage each and everyone of them to live as a proud member of a society. Architecture plays its part in communicating such a message to the public. Passerby who walk pass this place or have a chance to use the spaces will be introduced to new, interesting experiences that will broaden the boundary of what a good design used to be defined, through stories and details that create something more than just beauty but a design creation attentively realized and materialized for everyone without leaving anyone behind.
From our view, these things represent something that is far more than just a simple sports training facility. In most people’s perception, sports aims at finding the winner. But inside the Olympics’ bible writes ‘The winner is not just a hero, but the heroes are everyone who join the Olympics’, meaning that all the athletes taking part in this sports event deserve everyone’s utmost respect.
