ARGE Gerner Gerner Plus AllesWirdGut

Description

The Red Emma is a potato cultivar. Inspired by its red-skinned namesake, once cultivated on these grounds, the residential quarter focuses on regional and social rootedness. In creating high everyday residential quality, the project is informed by three core ideas: First, the design provides reduced building depth, so the elongated, compact units gain a larger façade, allowing, on the inside, the partitioning of an extra room for flexible use. Second, the balconies in the estate are designed as functional green open-air spaces which, with windbreak panels and planter troughs, form an outdoor extension of the home. Third, barrier-free accessible areas on the ground floor, with cultural, social and commercial offerings, contribute to neighbourly relations. In addition to public institutions such as an adult-education centre, a kindergarten, an event venue, and a flower and grocery store, the plinth area with a uniform four-metre ceiling height accommodates communal rooms with washing facilities and access to open spaces for residents. Each floor of the slender hybrid-timber structures includes a multipurpose room and a rentable coworking space. On top, roof gardens, informed by local agriculture, compensate for the built-up footprint. Pergolas with photovoltaic modules provide sheltered spaces and opportunities for urban gardening, with grey water supporting crops that can later be sold in the ground-floor store.