The train station forecourt in Aarau is facing another urban development. The modern ensemble of the new station building and the lightweight roof (“cloud”) is expected to be supplemented by the new building of the hotel Aarauerhof by 2021. The days of Justus Dahinden’s lumbering existing building from the 1970s are numbered.
The architectural office :mlzd with its project “Mula” has been the winner of the competition, carried out by the owner, the Zurich gastronomy group ZFV. Lüchinger+Meyer supported the design work in façade planning. The design envisages a compact structure with eight upper floors and two basements, in which 80 hotel rooms will be accommodated. The design of the facades with the high glass content takes up the materialisation of the adjacent railway station.
Ground and top floors intended for public use stand out from the curtain-wall-element façades of the hotel Floors.
The textile awnings stretching out to the sides of the plaza are meant to deprive the building of the overly smooth seriousness and reminding of the 19th century hotel architecture.
We are pleased with the jury’s verdict, according to which “the large-format division of the façade gives the façade an independent expression with the necessary directness and authenticity.”
The hotels seminar room on the 1st floor, will give interested parties the chance to see the eight submissions for the last time. The exhibition is opened on Wednesday, 13th of March from 5.30 p.m. to 8 p.m.