Amid the massive blocks of the Rennbahnweg Estate, built in the 1970s on the periphery of Vienna as Austria’s then largest municipal housing project, PARKLIFE presents itself as a stage, auditorium, activities space, and multifunctional usable sculpture for the recreational child and youth care program which, in 2010, had been already operated for ten years by the Vienna Municipal Park Attendants Service, or more specifically, the “Institut für Erlebnispädagogik,” as a free all-year program. PARKLIFE was developed by twenty-four architecture students under the supervision of Peter Fattinger in a Design-Build course held at the Vienna University of Technology and was then erected on site by the students themselves.

Inside, PARKLIFE accommodates a weather-protected, heatable physical exercise and activities space which – like an auditorium – is also open to all sorts of public cultural events from theatrical performances and film screenings to musical concerts. Generously dimensioned seating steps lead into a higher-level retreat area affording a panoramic view of the surrounding park. A handicraft workshop completes the spatial offering of PARKLIFE, providing, in combination with an adjacent construction playground, a field of experimentation for children and young people to try out, with instruction and supervision, different construction materials and tools.