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| Hypo Alpe-Adria Center Klagenfurt, Austria Client: Hypo Alpe-Adria Bank Carinthia Program: 250,000 sf commercial office space, retail space, kindergarten, parking Complete: 2002 The Hypo Alpe-Adria-Center is situated approximately six kilometers east of the center of Klagenfurt, Austria, where the expanding city extends into its outlying suburban and agricultural regions. As with many contemporary edge-city conditions, most new construction in the area has resulted in dislocated fragments of buildings surrounded by open parking areas. Adjacent large-scale commercial developments and the surrounding suburban housing areas further complicate this suburban landscape. The concept aims to integrate the inherent qualities of both rural and urban typologies. The large domed roof vaults over most of the structure, creating a conceptual landscape that evokes the plowed fields surrounding it. Stretching from east to west across the site, the structure integrates itself into its surroundings and emerges from the ground as “reconfigured earth.” Like the seismic shifting of tectonic plates, the bank headquarters itself erupts out of this pregnant, expectant form clad in sheet metal, declaring its status as a major cultural and civic institution and connecting the public forum with the street. Pedestrian pathways have been forged into the organic form of the building mass as cardo and decumanus, logical extensions of the existing street grid, which are stretched across the built landscape as grounding elements of the site. In response to the busy Volkermarkt Strasse to the south the site presents its most dense urban elements. Here the public forum space is positioned along the decumanus and directly connected to the existing street intersection with a large canopy, inviting the public into the events center and bank branch. Further penetrating the structure, a network of pedestrian walkways lead to commercial and office space. In contrast, the northern section of the site connects it with the suburban, rural environment with open gardens facing low-density housing. Departments within the building encircle an enclosed, skylit courtyard, which provides the bank branch on the ground floor with natural light from above. On each floor, bridges link the elevator core and lobbies surrounding the courtyard with the larger building mass. These bridges break through the façade and create balconies overlooking the city streets to the north. The northern wing of the building, clad in perforated aluminum, terminates in an exterior stair, which also penetrates the South façade and links the executive floor with the roof terrace. The many intersections created by the building’s design scheme provide varied office configurations for each department. A large Brise-soleil emerges on the south face of the building serving as a passive shade device to the glass curtain wall. A simple palette of five basic materials is used to articulate the various building components: glass, sheet metal, perforated aluminum panels, concrete board panels, and exposed concrete. Interior materials consist of terrazzo, tile, and carpeted floors, gypsum board walls and ceilings, and perforated panel ceilings. The interior of the event center includes wood floors and perforated wood wall panels. Through the development of an urban concept that integrates both the urban and rural qualities of the site, the Hypo Bank project literally emerges from its context. It is not a freestanding institution, but an urban environment with social purposes that can be sensed. |
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