Telegraf 7, Wien

BEHF Architects

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Modern offices in an impressive period context

BEHF Ar­chi­tects of Vienna have com­pleted a very special project in the city’s Sixth Dis­trict, right next to Linke Wien­zeile with its cap­ti­vat­ing art nouveau façades. The re­vi­tal­is­ing con­ver­sion of the old tele¬graph office at Lehárgasse 7 im­pres­sively marries listed-build­ing con­ser­va­tion to the most ex­act­ing demands made of modern office premises. A time-worn plaque hung di­rectly behind the en­trance stairs reads: “Built in 1898 during the glo­ri­ous reign of His Majesty Emperor Franz Joseph I”. And im­pe­r­ial the ar­chi­tec­ture cer­tainly is too. The late-his­tori­cist struc­ture planned by the ar­chi­tect Eugen Fass­ben­der is notable for its lavish or­na­men­ta­tion, in the process ably fusing pres­ti­gious ar­chi­tec­ture with the func­tion­al­ity of a tele­phone ex­change op­er­ated by the Aus­tro-Hun­gar­ian Post Office and Tele­graph Di­rec­torate.

Strik­ing newel stair­cases lead the way up inside. Cor­ri­dor ceil­ings are or­nately adorned with painted floral dec­o­ra­tion. The build­ing with its in­te­rior court­yard, two ad­join­ing wings and gen­er­ous di­men­sions pri­mar­ily sug­gested itself for com­mer­cial pur­poses. The client sought a con­tem­po­rary office build­ing with a form of bran¬ding that evinces in­di­vid­u­al­ism, sets itself apart from Vienna’s chic and pricy First Dis­trict and appeals to cus­tomers in search of the cre­ative hub between Naschmarkt, Gumpen­dor­fer and Mari­ahil­fer Strasse. The client im­me­di­ately moved into the most im­pos­ing premises them­selves; the two tele­graph halls some 98 feet long and 39 feet wide that extend over the third and fourth floors form the cen­tre­piece of the re­vi­talised build­ing, serving as the pres­ti­gious new cor­po­rate head­quar­ters of the JP Real Estate Group.

With the build­ing’s com­ple­tion in March 2017, company staff took up duty at ul­tra­mod­ern work­sta­tions, both in small offices and com­mu­nal areas, where female tele­phon­ists had once, back in the early 20th century, sat at rows of long tables con­nect­ing calls by hand. The aim of the re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion scheme was to create of­fic­ing with state-of-the-art in­fra­struc­ture within the period fabric whilst si­mul­ta­ne­ously doing ar­chi­tec­tural justice to the listed build­ing. This first en­tailed, as it so often does, de­con­struct­ing what­ever in the past had impeded visual access to the beauty of the ar­chi­tec­ture. Sub­se­quently fitted in­ter­me­di­ate levels and sus­pended ceil­ings were removed and any holes in the ceiling paint­ings they had given rise to were re­paired so as to allow the splen­did neo-Re­nais­sance dec­o­ra­tion and fash­ion­ing of space to once again shine forth as orig­i­nally in­tended.

Architects and building

Photo: © Markus Kaiser

Armin Ebner of BEHF Ar­chi­tects sums their concept thus: “The actual space with its im­pos­ing height, ceiling paint­ings and pi­lasters is a major ex­pe­ri­ence in its own right, con­trast­ing as it does with the two dis­placed, vir­tu­ally sphere-like office boxes. It is this jux­ta­po­si­tion that drives the special effect and at­mos­phere there is here.”

Replacing old with new

So as to avoid having to sub­di­vide the huge spaces anew, the ar­chi­tects hit upon the idea of in­stalling two min­i­mal­ist glass boxes as room-within-a-room struc­tures that open up fresh scope for or­der­ing the space. The ground floor of one of the boxes houses office spaces and, on its roof, 1,800 square feet of event floor­space reached by means of a spiral stair­case. The second box con­tains four single offices and con­fer­ence rooms to­gether with an open-plan office on the upper floor. The spa­cious un­en­closed re­cep­tion area im­presses on account of its high air space. The neu­trally white glass of the in­serted cubes re­flects the his­tor­i­cal ar­chi­tec­ture whilst also soft­en­ing the corners of the new struc­ture, which links up spher­i­cally with the rest of the space. Frosted pat­tern­ing on the glass dis­solves towards the bottom, bring­ing the timber floor­ing through­out the hall into view and causing the boxes to appear to hover weight­lessly

Mean­ing­fully aug­ment­ing what’s already there without being con­fronta­tional was what the ar­chi­tects were after. That also applies as regards the fur­ni­ture and the choice of ma­te­ri­als and colours. What’s new in Telegraf 7 is “com­pletely de­tached” from what’s old, seeking neither sev­er­ance nor his­tori­cist ap­prox­i­ma­tion. The made-to-mea­sure fitted fur­ni­ture de­signed by the ar­chi­tects them­selves is func­tional and evolves in line with the space. Mobile fur­nish­ings in black har­monise with the heavily grained wood, their unfussy moder­nity going hand in hand with the lov­ingly de­tailed his­tor­i­cal wall and ceiling dec­o­ra­tion. The res­ur­rected fin-de-siècle ar­chi­tec­ture is proof of how good design that is more than merely fash­ion­able can elicit en­thu­si­as­tic re­sponses through­out the ages. The ar­chi­tects have opted for a door lever handle for the Lehárgasse 7 prop­erty that is as time­less as it is modern.

The model in ques­tion, the ar­chi­tects argue, is replete with “design acumen”, its “crafted looks” seem­ingly “a product of the smithy’s forge”. Its design adheres to the clas­si­cal formal canon. The ma­te­ri­al­ity of these handles, which have been fitted in Pol­ished Waxed Brass, echoes the chro­matic iden­tity of the period sur­faces, yet they also har­monise mar­vel­lously with the new ma­te­ri­als in­cor­po­rated such as the ash of the fit­ments and floors or the sim­i­larly bronze-coloured office doors, lift linings and floor in­di­ca­tors. The FSB 1106 model is also to be en­coun­tered in the rest of the build­ing. It has been fitted in Ground Stain­less Steel both in the build­ing gen­er­ally and in most of the other offices. It was pre­cisely such design vari­a­tions for the handles coupled with “trust in tech­nol­ogy and service” that per­suaded the ar­chi­tects to opt for FSB pro¬ducts. The outcome of their ar­chi­tec­tural work for the Telegraf 7 project has already re­ceived several ac­co­lades and has reaped them honours such as the Best Ar­chi­tects 18 Award, the Iconic Award 2017, the German Design Award 2018 or the “AAP Amer­i­can Ar­chi­tec­ture Prize 2017”.

Building details

Photos: © Hertha Hurnaus, hurnaus.​com

Location

Telegraf 7

Lehárgasse 7
1060 Vienna
Austria

Di­rec­tions