Siemensgründe

By articulating the contextual references, bybringing together the givens and interpreting their potential alively, complex housing system, a place in which it is good to livehas been created out of the mono-typical enclave of the old Siemensdevelopment.

The design of the outdoor spaces is shaped by thegoal of not only preserving all the existing trees but alsointegrating them in the concept so that they can exert an impact. Inthis regard particular mention should be made of the row of planetrees in the main courtyard and of the trees incorporated in thespatial construction of connecting bridges and stairs at theDiesterweggasse passageway. Designed as a park, the main courtyard isgiven a reflective water basin and a play area for young people. Theplayground for small children is a trapezoidal hilly landscape and islocated in the courtyard of the L-shaped building that defines thenorth-eastern corner of the site. Each of the smaller courtyards ofthe freestanding H-shaped building acquires a specific character byplanting birch trees in one and yew trees in the other.

We discovered that the level of the access fromDiesterweggasse is exactly that of the permitted building height ofthe small-scale part of project on Penzinger Straße described above.Here we developed an accessible urban plateau that serves as accessbut above all vertically articulates the entire project intohorizontal layers.

This differentiation makes the tallest buildingseem only eight storeys high, it appears to “hover“ above aplinth and is also emphasised by the use of colour: for the upperparts of the building a gleaming white cladding is proposed, whilethe embedded parts of the building, intended to be read as part ofthe topography and urban structure, are to be clad in ananthracite-shade. The northern part of the upper structure is, ofcourse, integrated in the large-scale structure of Cumberlandgasse.