Published on Archi.ru (https://archi.ru)

29.09.2009

Shift of poles

Anna Martovitskaya
Studio:
ABD architects

In Moscow on Gilyarovsky street ABD Architects bureau designed a 9-storey office complex, which silhouette resembles a pile of books. The project is an illustrative proof that a dense surrounding housing and a small area can’t be an obstacle for creating a comfortable and interesting building.

From the very start the architects realized that experiments with the shape of the building won’t be appropriate because in such density they will end with reducing of effective area. So ABD Architects started with a simple parallelepiped and then fit it for the specific requirements of the site and the client. In particular, the task was to observe all the fire protection regulations, provide the access for fire engines. The road was "stretched" from Shchepkina street. To make the turn-around area and the entrance to the underground parking lot they had to give a part of the ground floor. This suggested the image of the entire complex. Since the architects "bite off" fifth part of the ground floor, the upper levels are hanging over the hall entrance with a spectacular console. To avoid excessive heaviness of the element, the three top floors of the complex are shifted and leveled with the first floor. They form a console on the opposite façade hanging over the garden. ABD Architects developed a special system of glassing for the facades of the office complex - opaque and transparent panels alternate shifted on the half of each module. Such arrangement creates an interesting visual effect: from different angles the facades look differently. Transparent and opaque segments are overlapped and shuffled like cards and in the result the building looks airy and light but it is absolutely impossible to see anything inside. The maneuver will exclude unwanted visual contacts which are hard to avoid in the dense surrounding.

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