Double victory on the lakeside
Every attentive walker on Zurich’s lake basin knows the office building at Bellerivestrasse 36. A building, which is shielded from the hustle and bustle on the lakeside by hedges and masonry walls.
The owner, Allreal, is now planning to modernise the building (built in 1974) by 2023 and to extend it with a publicly accessible restaurant directly on Lake Zurich. A corresponding study assignment ended with a surprisingly positive result for Lüchinger+Meyer. The project by the Danish office C.F. Møller Architects was recommended for further development. Our structural engineers supported the design work. The second place was awarded to the proposal of Michael Müller Marius Hug Architekten. Civil engineers and facade planners of Lüchinger+Meyer were involved in this project.
Both proposals were praised by the jury. C. F. Møller’s design succeeds in finding a convincing solution for the task in hand through “a differentiated examination of the requirements”. In the case of the project ranked second, the jury commended in particular “the in-depth examination of the construction of the PV-canopies and the development of the elegant and unobtrusive facade”.
The structural design of the winning project envisions that, for economic reasons, interventions in the existing structure should be kept to a minimum and that the essential structural elements of the reinforced concrete skeleton construction should remain unchanged. The necessary seismic strengthening of the existing load-bearing structure is achieved by systematically eliminating the horizontal open joints between the individual building sections and their favouring frictional interlocking. The enlargement of the facade’s column spacing will partially be compensated by replacing the existing supporting elements with high-strength components. The slab edges along the intended opening for the representative new stair connection will be locally reinforced with adhesive reinforcement. This reinforcing principle is also used in the few slab areas with increased loads.
