Hovering Mass
It is more than a modular, flexible and clearly zoned hall. Natural lighting with two light sources and the suspended ceiling beams create a "interplay between structural mass, lightness and mobility of the structural elements" in the hall’s large volume, says the originator of the design, Professor Susanne Gross from kister scheithauer gross architekten und stadtplaner.
The new Learning Center Mechanical Engineering (LZM) of Technische Universität Darmstadt is a three-storey building with an effective floor area of 2,750 square metres. It accommodates four computer pool rooms for 320 students as well as machine halls for about 20 different test benches for the Departments of Structural Dynamics, Mechatronic Systems, Data Processing in Construction as well as Product Development and Machine Elements. The solid reinforced concrete building was designed and implemented by kister scheithauer gross architekten und stadtplaner.
Professor Susanne Gross, the originator of the design, explains the concept: “The centrally positioned hall with a length of 52.5 metres and a ceiling height of nine metres is conceived as a spatial volume that continuously captures a maximum of daylight from two light sources. The two light sources run parallel to each other along their entire length and reinforce each other: a skylight strip catches cenithal light along a room edge and is complemented by an opposite, high window strip facing north.
On this side, a ceiling upstand “shovels” in additional daylight by means of reflection. This creates a nearly shadowless illumination of the interior space during the day. At the intersections with the exterior wall, the solid concrete beams are tapered with coves; they are not supported by the wall, but suspended from it. Below this intersection of ceiling and wall, a crane runway runs across the entire length on crane girders and reinforced concrete consoles. The contours of the hall are not symmetrical and the beams seem to float despite their solid design. This results in an interplay between the structural mass, lightness and mobility of structural elements in the hall’s large volume.”
The basis of the entire design is a 1.25 m grid, which allows the greatest possible flexibility in the hall as well as in the seminar and office areas. The modular hall can be flexibly subdivided according to functions and is supplied with the necessary technical media in a decentralised way via a supply ring. Regarding its form and content, the institute building blends in with the existing structure of the listed university ensemble dating from the 1970s. For example, ksg planned the new Learning Center with a monolithic precast concrete façade, whose materiality refers to the existing buildings located to the east and west. The office area in the southern building recess was finished with a contrasting, rear-ventilated metal curtain façade.
Another building kister scheithauer gross is currently planning and building for TU Darmstadt on the Lichtwiese Campus is the Test Bench Building for Machine Acoustics, which is located in immediate vicinity of the LZM.
