Singer Baenziger Architekten . photos: © Christian Senti
The residential area located in Zurich’s Unterstrass quarter is comprised of two-story town houses built in 1928 and arranged around the grounds of a former tennis club. Despite their location in a three-story residential zone, the buildings are basically unchanged.
This project was the first to implement the potential of an additional story. The prevalent practice of adding an additional floor underneath a pitched roof – stretching the existing volume of the building, as it were – was deliberately avoided. With a classic modernist flat roof reminiscent of the former tennis club and projects by original protagonists of modernism such as Adolf Loos and Josef Frank, the ridge line remains more or less consistent and the building is well integrated within its surroundings. The stepping of the volume has created exterior spaces for variable use on two floors, meeting the owners’ needs for more light and better inclusion of exterior areas. Despite its timber construction due to structural constraints, the new building volume is externally quite similar to the old part of the building. Thanks to Aerogel thermal insulation rendering, the old building was successfully adapted to meet energy efficiency requirements without having to alter existing window enclosures, thus creating a seamless transition to the neighboring building. Existing design features such as clinker brick lines join new elements based on classic modernism, like the pergola or the round window. At first glance it seems as though the added story has always been there. A closer look reveals interesting details and references identifying the more recent renovation work. Indoors, too, the original character of the materials is maintained. Wooden panels of different heights and colors – actual shells for the new timber construction – refer to the old finishes and create a variety of moods. Blue and white cement tiles provide a suitable mediterranean accent in the garret room to round off the suite of new rooms in style.
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