Meier Leder Architekten
Apartment house on Gartenstrasse
best architects 19 in gold
multi-family homes
Place
Baden / Switzerland
Studio
Photos
Oliver Lang
Description
With its expressive architecture, the replacement building manages to assert itself in an environment of larger volumes. Its placement as close as possible to the street for urban planning purposes allows for a new, broad courtyard. On the side facing the courtyard, an open arcade staggers the façade in depth and forms a buffer to the private rooms. The main entrance to the building on the city side is emphasised by outdoor flights of stairs. This additional external staircase connects the courtyard, the arcade and a shared roof terrace to create a three-dimensional outdoor space as an important meeting place for the residents.
The apartments are based on the principle of room sequences as an efficient spatial typology and function without corridors. Internal glazing creates a high degree of transparency and flexibility of use. The three-season room functions as a central distribution space that can be opened up across its entire breadth. French doors onto Gartenstrasse lend the building an urban character. The deep, staggered relief of the wooden cladding gives the house a warm tonality. Inside, slurried sand-lime brickwork contrasts with wood-framed glazing and coloured granolithic concrete.
»Using the simplest of means, this project creates an urban look that skilfully integrates a few elements not normally found in a city, such as access arcades and a wooden façade. The reduction to the essentials is also evident in the interior, where the spaces are grouped around a multi-purpose garden room that adds an atmospheric touch to the domestic surroundings.«
(Statement of the Jury)
Meier Leder Architekten
»Despite the growing importance of interdisciplinary work in today's professional world, we still believe in the importance of our architectural responsibility for the design of the built environment. We endeavor to achieve a diligence and durability of the used structures and materials through a tradition-bound work. In the process of designing, we try to find a superior theme for the location and the specific needs of the users. At the stage of realization, things are consciously brought to their essential substance and always evolve in the context of the whole. In the end, the concept of a design should be able to unite the complex and often contradictory demands and requirements in an obvious and holistic solution. This exploration, which leads beyond the purely technical application to the tactile, sensual qualities of an architectural intervention, is captured in the form of inner images and moods. An attempt to trace the inconspicuous, so that architecture is able to touch again.«
