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Laurus and Actis present Mario Cucinella Architects' project in Ghana, 11th May 2011

date added: 13.05.2011

Laurus Development Partners, a property company founded by private equity firm Actis, was launched May 11th in Accra, and in this occasion they presented One Airport Square (OAS), a Mario Cucinella Architects’ project for the city of Accra in Ghana.

OAS is a complex, located in Accra’s growing commercial district of Airport City that will provide office and retail space and is designed to serve a social point for Ghanaians. The environmentally sustainable architecture of this project is in line with the efforts of the Accra Metropolitan Assembly to maximize land use in the capital.

The Laurus and Actis’ choice of Ghana as headquarters of the business is due to the fact that Accra is fast becoming the business hub of the region with a great demand for office and leisure facilities.

Commenting on the project, Mr. Carlo Matta, CEO of Laurus, said that One Airport Square will turn a point because this project intended to be innovative in this geographic area: “our projects are designed to be ahead of their time, we don’t just build a project for today, but for ten, twenty, fifty years time”.

Mario Cucinella Architects’ conceived One Airport Square with the ambition to make a significant contribution to improving this landscape. This project will be a leading example in ethical standards, best practice, and in environmental and social sustainability.

OAS project responds to the challenge of finding a balanced integration between new technologies and tradition to demonstrate that high efficiency design should not necessarily equate only to technology. An integrated design process is the key element to bring innovation and contribute to spread a sustainable awareness in Ghana. It takes ispiration from the local tropical modernist tradition, where architectural and aesthetic elements are driven by environmental strategies as response to local climatic conditions.

One Airport Square is the first certified “green” commercial in Ghana. This will set an example and will raise the bar for future developments in West Africa.

Mr. Mario Cucinella is award-winning for the second time (2009 and 2011) of MIPIM Awards 2011 in “Green Building”; his project is presented in a press conference in Accra, Ghana the 11th of May 2011.