Hermansson Hiller Lundberg Arkitekter

Description

The site was typical for much of the architecture created today: a mixture of scales and programmes, without a clear grammar for the surroundings – a kind of non-context. The project presented a curious mix of fixed and fluid conditions. While the building envelope was set by the zoning plan and the construction method was specified as prefabricated timber-frame construction modules with fibre-cement cladding, the programme was in constant flux during the entire project. At various stages the architects were designing a care home, private apartments to be offered for sale, migrant worker rental units on the upper floors combined with, variously, a school for disabled children, a kindergarten, or assisted-living units for disabled people on the ground floor. All of these programmes had to be reconciled with the construction criteria and meet the strictest possible budget while using a material palette consisting of the cheapest possible, low-maintenance façade you can build in Sweden. From these very circumscribed conditions, the architects explored the expressive possibilities of the façades and managed to convince the client to give up some precious square metres so they could make some incisions to calibrate the building volume along the street. In the resulting, striking composition, buildings elements and patterns sometimes seem to crash into one another, while the whole is surprisingly balanced. This treatment of the façade and the volumes ends up achieving an understated yet intricate monumentality.