Modersohn & Freiesleben Architekten

Description

In a narrow 12-metre canyon between 60-metre-long fire walls on bustling Chausseestrasse in Berlin an apartment house was erected. It is made up of a front building and a garden building, as well as a side wing, with a passage leading into the interior of the block. Above the commercial premises on the ground and first floors (372 sqm) are 23 apartments with 2–5 rooms (2,500 sqm of total floor space). A wide bay dominates the symmetrical street facade, while large windows let maximum daylight into the deep rooms. Ceramic construction tiles in combination with the windows and glazed ceramic accents bedeck the façade. The same materials turn the back of the garden building into a main façade in the interior of the block. Here, loggias whose varying sizes are defined by clearance areas tie together two-storey maisonettes. The fact that a calm façade impression has nonetheless been created is part of the challenge of building in the existing fabric.