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Public Realm

UNStudio wins competition for community-focused mixed-use tower in Düsseldorf

The articulation of the tower is designed to fit within its surrounding context while expressing the different scales and the liveliness of the building’s different uses

by Hannah Holt 24 June 2022 Urban design

Cologne-based project developer PANDION recently held an International Architectural Competition for a new mixed-use high-rise building in Düsseldorf.

The design by UNStudio and OKRA Landscape Architects was chosen by the jury as the winning design by majority vote. 

The 90 m tall building will be located at the entrance of the city, on the perimeter of the Belsenpark masterplan urban development in the Oberkassel district.

The positioning of two additional low-rise buildings forms an intimate park. A programmed pedestrian axis that runs from underneath the nearby elevated road, through the building and into the courtyard park, ensures connectivity for pedestrians and cyclists.

The mixed-use tower will house offices on the lower levels and a mix of apartment types above. The two low-rise buildings comprise cost-controlled housing.

Below the seventh floor, the residential high-rise merges into flexibly designed co-working office spaces. The dimensions of the floor plan are ideal for creating flexible office spaces comprising a mix of cell structures and contemporary work environments. 

One side of the Belsenpark tower faces a busy elevated road junction, a source of high level noise pollution. Despite this, all of the apartments in the tower have an outdoor area. On the sides of the building facing the street, the apartments have loggias which are enclosed by sound-reducing baffle panes. The surrounding noise is further reduced both by a ventilation gap in the baffle pane and by sound-absorbing wooden linings inside the loggia.

On the lower area of the building, slightly iridescent light aluminium elements and white plaster facades of the price-controlled living programme reflect the materiality of the context, while light natural stone elements characterise the appearance of the tower next to the warm wood-clad loggias.

The integrated rainwater approach combines green components with sustainable water management tools to create a green-blue system that can buffer rainwater. Rainwater is captured on the green roofs via a water retention layer, while the overflow is directed to the planting in the pocket park. The overflow of this water, in addition to all runoff from the hard surfaces in the park, is directed to the main water feature via visible gutters. This location can also be used as a detention basin during extreme flooding, providing a strategy for a circular water system. The water feature is gradually channelled into a rainwater tank and reused for watering plants during dry periods.

In addition to using prefabricated components in construction and taking a modular approach to the supporting structure, facade and building services, the aim is to significantly reduce CO2 emissions during operations.


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