HERTL.ARCHITEKTEN: Ennspumpstation - best architects 08

HERTL.ARCHITEKTEN

Ennspumpstation

best architects 08

commercial/industrial buildings

Place

Steyr | Österreich

Photos

Hertl Architekten

Description

In order to supply the industrial plateau of the earlier ‘Steyr Werke’ with cooling water, at the beginning of the 20th century in two stages a pumping station at the river Enns was established. Since that time in the function nothing changed. However the covering was meanwhile damaged of the floods. To correspond to the meaning of the industrial monument in an extraordinary situation and to give the hardly structured passage road a characteristic, we worked with colours, that secure attention for the house in the surrounding field. Thus it contributes to the consolidation of the city body without large interventions. Two pump halls are connected by an inbetween part, which was originally erected as bridge construction on columns. In the meantime it was closed for storage spaces. Satinated glazings now refer to its earlier appearance. Upstairs a dwelling with small windows is accommodated. Now glass panels are set forward to these windows. They increase the psychological distance to the road for the occupants and cover the three building parts with a row of coloured glass panels. Their height is adapted to the large windows of the machinery buildings. The two huge bases made of ramming concrete were uncovered, to make the organization of the building readable. They are painted water-rejecting in the same colour as the restored plaster surfaces of the house: Wine red is an adjustment to the colour of the 

roof. But primarily it is an unobtrusive and nevertheless special background colour for the abstract row of glass panels and it contributes to the elegant appearance of the building.