ETB

Residencial And Culture Center . Geneve

courtesy of ETB studio

The new building houses (for livings) looks for a compromise between the historic building at 10 rue des Grottes, urban heart of the neighborhood and subject of restoration, and the adjacent buildings on the east part of the project area, through a strategy of limiting the impact of the facade on the main street through alignments in plan to make more fluid the change in scale between the new and the old. This strategy creates a building that interacts with urban and social space establishing with it a favoured visual connection. The light (smooth – armonioso) movements of the façade invite to many points of view over the city, reinforcing the extrovert aspect of this architecture in the lively area “des Grottes”. The new building also expands in the northwestern part of the lot, redefining blind the northern front of the existing bluiding. The new plant foreseens on the ground floor two commercial spaces overlooking the streets of access, technical service areas of the residence and lifts (reclimbing); the upper levels distributed in six floors with 15 apartments in total. The existing building is modified in a gentle and respectful way for public use, as required by the notice.  The original perforated patterns and the coverage are preserved, keeping the traditional aspect of this architecture.