RADIO AND TV DEPARTMENT OF THE SILESIAN UNIVERSITY, KATOWICE
16/05/2011.
Competition. [KATOWICE] Poland
metalocus, JOSÉ JUAN BARBA
metalocus, JOSÉ JUAN BARBA
BAAS Jordi Badia & GRUPA5 win the International competition announced by the Silesia University to built the Radio and TV department in Katowice, Poland.
Picture © BAAS
The new Silesia University’s Radio and TV department will be located on a vacant plot, inserted in a consolidated area of Katowice. The plot, mainly empty, contains an abandoned building which the client initially planned to demolish.
Our winning proposal plans to preserve this existing building, and add an extention to it while protecting the character of the old. The project also includes a lower height building occupying the interior block area which confers to the central courtyard the intervention’s prominence.
Our design aims to be sensitive with the existing building aesthetics and takes advantage of its materiality and visual values by building on top of it and abstract volume made out of a brick latticework, which follows the neighbour’s section.
The new building fills up the whole plot and at the same time hollows a central courtyard, becoming this, the key element for all the social activities taking place around the studios and lecture rooms at the new university department.