The first apartment sales have been closed for the ‘O’, an MVRDV-designed high-rise that – as one of four letter-shaped apartment buildings that together spell out the word HOME – forms one of the standout elements of Mannheim’s Franklin Mitte neighbourhood. The 15-storey building mixes 120 apartments with ground level commercial units and a bar and terrace. With its playful shape, the building also functions as a local landmark, and a key contributor to the character of the neighbourhood at large.
Design Team: Jeroen Zuidgeest, Markus Nagler, Christine Sohar, Philipp Kramer, Johannes Pilz, Mateusz Wojcieszek, Thomas Grievink, Eleonora Lattanzi, Dex Weel, Manuel Magnaguagno, Mikel Vazquez, Magdalena Gorecka
In Europe’s second largest baroque castle schneider+schumacher have created a modern study and conference center for Mannheim Business School, which was officially opened today. A decommissioned boiler room and its associated coal cellar dating from the 1950s have been transformed into landscape art at Mannheim’s palace. “Dug into the garden, the new complex and the historic building together form a remarkable new entity, yet in a stylistic idiom that is unequivocally 21st century, proving that the future is firmly rooted in the past”, claims Michael Schumacher who, together with Till Schneider, owns schneider+schumacher.
Due to irreparable damage, the existing buildings in this block had to be demolished. This was done in stages and construction work on the new residential buildings proceeded in four phases. Careful management of the construction project enabled the residents to remain in the development. The new apartments are well equipped and barrier-free in design; on the ground floor the apartments have a garden, on the main floors, broad balconies and on the top floors, generous roof terraces. This development reinstates the closed city-block structure at this point, with a clearly defined street side and a shared, private courtyard behind; as such it adheres to the existing development structure in the urban district of Lindenhof. Details such as the sandstone clinker-clad ground floor and the concrete windowsills are also taken from the forms found in the built environment of the immediate vicinity. Spread over nine years, this construction project provides a total of 235 cooperative housing apartments.
Article source: gmp Architekten von Gerkan, Marg und Partner
The new museum building at Friedrichsplatz in Mannheim links up with the historic Art Nouveau building and has been designed as “city in the city”. Within a simple overall structure, individual units have been arranged in an inspiring composition to provide exhibition space and rooms for supporting functions. They enclose a central atrium and are linked via galleries, terraces and bridges. In analogy to the elements that make up urban environments – buildings, blocks, streets and squares – the architects have created varied circular routes through enclosed and open spaces with changing vistas and outlooks. As in the layout of the city of Mannheim with its “street squares”, the clear overruling structure makes orientation easy; at the same time, each situation conveys new impressions – just as the city’s diversity of the architecture, changes in the building lines, recesses and empty plots ensure that no space is identical to another.
The installation is comprised of 81 cardboard boxes of 70x70x70 cm which are suspended on the ceiling in a grid of 80×80 cm. The boxes hang between floor and ceiling and can be seen from two different levels. 20 dc-motors are mounted and distributed along the handrail of the first floor. When activated, they set the boxes in motion by means of thinn nylon ropes connected vertically to the individual boxes, causing them to move with varying intensity and directions. Since the spaces between the boxes are small, the movement of one box is affecting neighboring boxes, leading to a very complex overall performance of the suspension, which constantly changes and progresses. The collision of the boxes and the friction caused when they collide gives rise to a multitude of sounds and noises. The acoustic perspective changes as the viewer moves along the exhibition space and can be experienced in constantly new ways. This installation was conceptualized, developed and presented in joint collaboration between Zimoun (artist) and Hannes Zweifel (architect).
Article source: Peter Stasek Architects + Loftwerk Karlsruhe
A very unusual loft is being created in the Mannheim harbor district. A very unusual loft has been created in the Mannheim harbor district. The complete ajando team will live and work there starting in January 2013. The internationally renowned architect Peter Stasek and the loftwerk architect office located in Karlsruhe are behind the corporate architecture concept of the loft. It was inspired by the quantum physics of Wheeler, the architecture of Josef M. Hoffmann and, of course, the information expertise of ajando.
The architects von Gerkan, Marg and Partners (gmp) have been awarded the contract to design the new Kunsthalle Mannheim. This was the decision made by the Kunsthalle‘s jury in Mannheim on Monday 3 December 2012. After three architect’s practices were awarded first place in a closed, anonymous competition back in July 2012, these practices were asked to revise their designs. The practices were gmp, Staab Architects and Peter Pütz Architects. Irrespective of the negotiation procedure, an exhibition started in October at which the public were able to familiarize themselves with the three winning entries.
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