Wiel Arets Architects will design the Europaallee 'Site D' in Zürich

WAA [Wiel Arets Architects] some days ago, won the competition to design the Europaallee 'Site D' in Zürich. This new building is an integral component of ‘Europaallee’, a currently emerging district adjacent to the city of Zürich’s central train station. Construction will begin in 2017, and is scheduled to finish in 2019.

Europaallee ‘Site D’. By WAA. Image courtesy of Wiel Arets Architects.

The building, designed by Wiel Arets Architects, has reusable offices and commercial spaces for future conversion into residential units.

Check out some renderings and more details of WAA's design below.

A plinth of retail programming anchors the project to its site, while its upper volumes consist of flexible office spaces that, due to their shallow depth and efficient façade grid, can be occupied by several individual companies or a larger singular tenant. These dual programs posed the challenge of creating two unique lighting and spatial requirements within this prominently sited building. The main entry has been positioned along the parallel ‘Europaaallee', and opens onto the ground floor's main retail and circulation spaces. From the ground floor, a central staircase complemented by two ramping escalators traverses and connects these areas. Foreseeing a possible conversion into future residential units, the building’s flexible structure was designed to allow for such a repurpose of its program. The resulting silhouette, and the alignment of its highest points with the trackside façades of the two adjacent plots, will ensure a powerful and unified building amid the area’s planned structures, further defining the distinguished context of the surrounding ‘Europaallee’.

Txt by WAA

CREDITS

Project team.- Wiel Arets, Alexis Bikos, Jelle Homburg, Jochem Homminga, Boris Wolf, Roel van der Zeeuw, Tieme Zwartbol.
Collaborators.- Marcos Romero, Olivier Brinckman.
Client.- SBB Immobilien.
Consultants.- Amstein + Walthert AG, JägerPartner AG SIA/USIC, B+P Baurealisation AG, GKP Fassadentechnik AG, 3D Studio Prins

Program.- Office, Retail.
Size.- 20.000m²
Date of design.- 2012-2013.
Date of completion.- 2017-2019.

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WIEL ARETS

Wiel Arets was born in 1955. In 1984 he established Wiel Arets Architect & Associates in his hometown of Heerlen, the Netherlands, after graduating from the Technical University of Eindhoven. From 1984-1989 he extensively travelled throughout North America, Russia and Japan. 1986 he co-founded the architectural journal Wiederhall. In 1988 he began teaching at the AA in London, paving the way for a future in worldwide academic and research-based teaching. In 1993 construction commenced on his design for the Academy of Art & Architecture, in Maastricht, the Netherlands, propelling him into the world of internationally recognized architectural prestige.

Wiel Arets' teaching curriculum vitae includes the world's most important and influential architecture schools and universities, including: the Architectural Academies of Amsterdam and Rotterdam from 1986-1989; the AA of London from 1988-1992; from 1991-1994 he was a visiting professor at The Copper Union and Columbia University in New York, USA, the Hochschule für Angewandte Kunst in Vienna and the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen; from 1995-1998 he was Dean of the Berlage Institute, Postgraduate Laboratory of Architecture in Amsterdam, and held the Berlage Institute Professorship at the Technical University Delft until 2009; in 2004 he accepted tenure professorship at the UdK in Berlin; in 2010 he was the Ruth and Norman Moore Visiting Professor at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, USA. Since 2003 he has served on the advisory board of Princeton University.

Wiel Arets' projects have been bestowed and honored with some of the highest achievements in architecture and product design: the 2010 "Amsterdam Architecture Prize", the 2010 "Good Design Award" for the Alessi products Salt.it, Pepper.it, Screw.it and Il Bagno dOt, the "BNA Kubus Award" for the entire oeuvre in 2005, the "UIA Nomination" as one of "the world’s one thousandth best buildings of the 20th century" for the Academy of Art & Architecture, Maastricht, the "Rietveld Prize" in 2005 for the University Library Utrecht, the "Mies van der Rohe Pavilion Award for European Architecture" with special mention "Emerging Architect" in 1994 for the Academy of Art & Architecture in Maastricht, the "Rotterdam Maaskant Award" in 1989 for the oeuvre, the "Charlotte Köhler Award" in 1988.