Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill

Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Exterior Photography, Facade, WindowsWinter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Exterior Photography, Windows, FacadeWinter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Exterior Photography, FacadeWinter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Exterior Photography, Windows, ChairWinter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - More Images+ 27

Amberes, Belgium
  • Team: Atelier Kempe Thill architects and planners André Kempe, Oliver Thill, Laura Paschke with: Martins Duselis, Andrius Raguotis, Teun van der Meulen
  • Urban Planning: Studio Associato Bernardo Secchi Paola Viganò, Milan / IT
  • Building Physics/ Epb: CES nv, Asse
  • General Contractor: Interbuild nv, Wilrijk
  • Aluminium Facade: Vorsselmans nv, Loenhout
  • City: Amberes
  • Country: Belgium
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Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Exterior Photography, Windows, Facade
© Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz

Text description provided by the architects. Atelier Kempe Thill searched for an architectural expression that could create a dialogue between this more traditional view on things and a possible more modernist orientation towards the future at the same time. The slightly higher budget compared to more common circumstances allowed in the end a very solid materialization hard to find within the contemporary condition of European housing.

Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Exterior Photography, Windows
© Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz

Technically the façade expression also has to solve the Belgian fire rules that consider winter gardens as inside spaces with the consequence that along the façade a distance of 1metre fire proof façade has to be respected between neighbours, horizontally as well as vertically.

Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Image 9 of 32
© Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz

For all these reasons the façades are set up in prefabricated concrete elements. Beams and columns have sections of 60 cm height x 40 cm depth to fulfil the distance of 1 metre for the fire department. The loadbearing beams along the east and west façades are up to 11,5m long and create winter gardens of an unusual length. This length assures that the relatively fat dimensions of the concrete elements are brought back into a harmonious proportion to their total size and add a refreshing monumental scale to the building as a total.

Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Image 28 of 32
1st Floor plan
Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Image 23 of 32
Cross section

On the head façades large scale non – load bearing concrete elements of partly 5,6 metres x 3,2 metres create a special quality out of the fact that the percentage of glass in the insulating part of the façade is limited.

Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Image 12 of 32
© Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz

For Atelier Kempe Thill it is the first time to work with a façade entirely made out of prefabricated concrete elements. The concrete is chosen in anthracite colour and with a smooth and polished surface. Each element is custom – made. The dimensions of the elements even allowed to integrate rainwater pipes and at the very end of the execution foldable fire ladders into the columns that had been demanded all of a sudden by the fire department.

Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Interior Photography, Table, Windows, Chair
© Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz

The concrete elements are combined with large single glass sliding doors for the winter gardens that on the fourth floor reach up to 3,2 metres by 3,5 metres per element.

Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Image 6 of 32
© Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz

To give the winter gardens a liveable and cosy atmosphere they are in the interior entirely covered by a wooden cladding. The “woodiness” of the terraces also contributes to the appearance at the outside giving the building a welcoming vibrancy balancing the formal monumentality of the concrete elements and the sliding doors. With this concept and all its ingredients the project tries to offer a modern and light life style with at the same time an architectural answer to the more physical character of Belgian culture.

Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill - Exterior Photography, Facade
© Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz

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Project location

Address:Antwerp, Belgium

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Location to be used only as a reference. It could indicate city/country but not exact address.
About this office
Cite: "Winter Garden Housing / Atelier Kempe Thill" 06 May 2019. ArchDaily. Accessed . <https://www.archdaily.com/916263/winter-garden-housing-atelier-kempe-thill> ISSN 0719-8884

© Architektur-Fotografie Ulrich Schwarz

冬季花园集合住宅/ Atelier Kempe Thill

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