Brönnerstrasse 22, Frankfurt am Main

NKBAK Architects

Products

1144
Door handle fitting

The FSB 1144 door handle is just as pleas­ing to the eye as it is to the hand. Jasper Mor­ri­son de­signed this door handle to be in­stantly recog­nis­able as a tool meant for the hand. Your eyes relax and your hand takes over. Your thumb falls into place, your fore­fin­ger finds its hollow and your hand finds some­thing sub­stan­tial to grasp. This is pre­cisely what the ‘Four-Point Guide to Good Grip’ drawn up by FSB and Otl Aicher calls for.

1144
Door handle fitting
1144
Door handle fitting

Replacing contrast with masonry

The straight­for­ward-sound­ing remit for the new-build venture at Brönner­straße 22 was to extend a Wil­helmin­ian house in inner Frank­furt into its back­yard. What made the task any­thing other than easy was the unusual nature of the ex­ist­ing back­yard. Rather than being closed off at the back, the yard opened up towards the ad­join­ing ceme­tery for the church of St. Peter’s. This is the oldest Chris­t­ian burial ground in the city. A fit­tingly pic­turesque ceme­tery wall bor­der­ing the area being in­filled fea­tures several fine mounted grave­stones and does, of course, enjoy listed con­ser­va­tion status.

Nicole Kerstin Bergan­ski and Andreas Kraw­czyk, part­ners in the NKBAK prac­tice com­mis­sioned to build the ex­ten­sion, ini­tially in­tended to con­tex­tu­alise the listed wall by setting a clear con­trast between it and the ma­te­ri­als they used. The con­ser­va­tion au­thor­ity opposed this, however. The design finally put to effect was hit upon during dis­cus­sions between the two parties. It sees itself as being a con­tin­u­a­tion of the nat­ural-stone ceme­tery wall, out of which a brick façade can be said to or­gan­i­cally rise up. “Anyone build­ing with brick”, Andreas Kraw­czyk argues, “has got to take stone se­ri­ously”. Which is what the ar­chi­tects have done, laying bricks in no fewer than three dif­fer­ent formats for their facades.

The upshot is a cubic struc­ture into which a variety of ashlars have been in­cor­po­rated and whose multi-coloured, hand-moulded bricks create a great sense of vi­brancy. The rhythm en­gen­dered by the range of masonry types laid serves to de­ter­mine the size and lo­ca­tion of the windows. Instead of en­clos­ing the yard with a rear build­ing set cross­wise on the edge of the plot, the ar­chi­tects have taken the liberty of fac­tor­ing the entire yard into their design de­lib­er­a­tions. A living land­scape of in­ter­mesh­ing in­ter­nal and ex­ter­nal spaces now pop­u­lates the former back­yard.

Architect and Building

Photo: ©Vanessa Fuentes

“Notwith­stand­ing the very complex point of de­par­ture, i.e. a listed ceme­tery wall and a poorly ac­ces­si­ble plot”, en­thuses Robert Volhard, founder and manager of Stylepark, “it’s a most mar­vel­lous build­ing that has taken shape here. The various ex­ter­nal sur­faces have been re­tained and they sig­nif­i­cantly enhance the quality of life and work on the site.”

Backyard infill

The in­ter­est­ing thing is that the struc­ture in no way blocks off the ex­ist­ing ex­ter­nal spaces. All open spaces have been re­tained, albeit it in meta­mor­pho­sized form. The cubic en­sem­ble gen­er­ates two in­ti­mate new court­yards that make for superb light­ing con­di­tions in the in­te­rior spaces, as well as fa­cil­i­tat­ing two roof ter­races at first- and sec­ond-storey level - a point that assured the design im­ple­mented a place amongst the five fi­nal­ists for the 2020 DAM Prize. The issue of whether infill con­struc­tion in inner cities can be achieved without sac­ri­fic­ing green spaces or social places is, after all, one of the most press­ing of our age given how scarce housing is in our major cities.

Each of the two upper floors of the build­ing houses a flat. The spaces on the ground floor, mean­while, serve the com­mis­sion­ing party, the Stylepark ar­chi­tec­ture and design mag­a­zine, as its new office spaces. These are con­nected to the offices on the raised ground floor in the older build­ing via a sin­gle-storey link. All spaces are char­ac­terised by open­ness, the struc­tur­ing role played by walls being kept to a minimum. Instead, zoning is brought about by means of dif­fer­ences in height brought about by steps or plat­forms. This fosters a sense of spatial con­ti­nu­ity which, whilst of­fer­ing a variety of at­mos­pheres, does not commit itself to spe­cific uses.

Choice objects tend to hold sway on a design mag­a­zine’s premises. Take the many-armed ceiling lu­mi­naire that hovers through the at­mos­phere like a shoal of jel­ly­fish dan­gling on slender threads. The spaces nev­er­the­less give the im­pres­sion of being focused on es­sen­tials. Cup­boards such as those in the fitted kitchen in the coffee area have no handles. The FSB handles on windows and doors “support the ar­chi­tec­ture from the wings without taking them­selves too se­ri­ously”, as the ar­chi­tects put it. They opted for FSB’s 1144 model, which they de­scribe as being warm, sleek and flat­ter­ing. It has been fitted in Stain­less Steel due to the ma­te­r­ial’s haptic cre­den­tials and dura­bil­ity.

Building details

Photos: ©Thomas Mayer

Location

Brönnerstraße 22 Frankfurt am Main

Brönner­straße 22
60313 Frank­furt am Main
Germany

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