The house with a gable, known from countless children’s drawings, is the German archetype of housing. This typology creates the foundation of a surprisingly unconventional home for a couple that moved from a converted school auditorium back to the region of their childhood: To the green neighborhood next to the forests of Leipzig, with lush gardens and family homes that are facing the street with their gables.

The defining characteristic of the neighborhood was translated into a gabled residential building. However, this figure did not remain alone. In keeping with the motto “two are better than one”, the overall appearance of the new building is made up of two offset, narrow volumes.
This makes it possible to remain within the axes of the neighboring buildings, to react to the scale of the surroundings and at the same time to create the required spaces in a compact way. Instead of simple typification, the architectural design aims to transform the existing components in a way that an independent architecture is created. A clear and straightforward building with precise openings into nature. The views focus in particular on the forest to the east and the orchard to the west.

At first glance, the double gable and the round windows do not seem to fit in with the typical townscape of the suburban location. The façade, with its rough-sawn surface made of board-formed exposed concrete, seems to be closer to the forest than to the neighboring houses.
And yet these familiar proportions blend naturally into the architectural surroundings.
The house is accessed via a densely planted front garden. This acts primarily as an arrival zone between public space and privacy.

Behind the exposed concrete of the exterior walls, thermal insulation made of ecological and energy-efficient hemp limestone was applied on the inside. This hemp limestone was used for the first time in Germany for this project.
A warm, finely textured clay plaster on the walls and ceilings creates a connection between the differently proportioned rooms. For the flooring in the public areas, a shimmering green natural stone was chosen, which is also used in the sanitary rooms and showers. Natural oiled oak parquet was laid in the upper, private rooms.

The atmospheric lighting of the surrounding nature is falling through the finely structured round portal into the entrance. Like in a cave, these arched shaped doors and passageways continue throughout the house and create a connection between the open cooking and dining area -a reminiscence of the barrel vault of the school auditorium, where the owners previously lived in Leipzig’s city center. The living level of the new building is slightly elevated and surprises with a space that extends up to the roof. The private master area is situated on another intermediate level; a few steps above are the rooms for children, guests and working. Each room celebrates the individual view into nature and deliberately plays with the discrepancy between the elongated double shape of the house and the structure of rooms contrary to that.
This confusion is reinforced by two bracing walls in the interior, whose concrete has been left unplastered and rough-sawn to match the façade.

Building projekt: Duplex | new building of a family home in Leipzig-Portitz
Client: private
Completion: 2023
Photographer: Clemens Poloczek

Deep in the Ore Mountains, in the small village of Hundsdübel near Stützengrün, the Mühle company has been manufacturing the finest shaving products for around 80 years. Handmade and locally manufactured from aluminum, wood, porcelain, resin and badger hair, they are known all over the world to people who shave.
For the expanding company, the narrow, on a slope situated factory site has been compacted with a new production hall.

The intention of the new additional building was to create a workplace with a refinement that resembles exactly Mühle’s products and working methods: local and high-quality, traditional and modern, sharp and yet cautious. Based on the urban planning specifications, the 400 square meter hall is positioned as a link between two existing buildings on the factory site.
It is divided into a high single-storey production section and a smaller two-storey area. The ground floor of this “house within a house” construction holds offices and administration rooms. The upper floor accommodates a large conference room with a view over the production hall.
Externally, the new building has a shimmering glass appearance. The glass allows the exterior spaces to flow inwards, provides insights into the production process and, last but not least, ensures maximum natural lighting in the hall.
The façade is structured by finely shimmering and precisely folded aluminum profiles – a deliberate reference to the fine shaving products that are manufactured here at the site. In contrast to the exterior appearance, the interior of the hall is characterized almost exclusively by wooden surfaces, that make it feel like a warming, sheltering body.

Simple and yet elegant, a wing-smoothed steel concrete floor forms the structural basis of the new building. The floor slab also provides the heating in the hall via an industrial floor heating system based on a ground water heat pump.
The building is supported towards the north-western slope by a steel concrete wall at the back, which is finished in exposed concrete.
Due to the proximity to the Ore Mountains and in the context of conscious building with renewable raw materials, all other load-bearing elements are designed as timber constructions. The columns and beams are made of laminated wood. Ceiling and roof are designed as solid cross-laminated timber elements. The internal window structures and acoustic cladding are also made of wood.
These natural materials not only provide good structural and insulating characteristics, but also ensure a healthy climate in the hall.
The roof, which is clearly visible from the village, is covered in greenery and houses the photovoltaics that supply the electricity for the geothermal heat pump.

Building project: Mühle Shaving, new construction of factory hall 4
Client: Mühle | Hans-Jürgen Müller GmbH & Co. KG
Completion: 2023
Photographer: Simon Menges; Felix Brüggemann

Behind the railroad tracks, in the south of Leipzig, the new southern combined heat and power plant rises with its characteristic, colourful cubes. It is the first combined heat and power plant in Germany that is completely operated with hydrogen. The new objects are basically made up of purely technical features. They are, in a way, an oversized engine block. But that also means that they could not be integrated in their surroundings without any further measures, because of the partly listed and very high-quality buildings around it. Under these circumstances the “Stadtwerke Leipzig” launched a design competition, which we could gladly win with our contribution of a “ceramic continuation”. The idea was to translate the exposed brickwork of the historic buildings with their yellow, brown, and reddish clinker bricks onto the three new buildings. Despite the solely technical function, the materials used for the facades were meant to create a high-quality appearance that corresponds with the surroundings and existing buildings. The material is therefore also fired clay. It was realized as a curtain facade, consisting of glazed panels with a fine, irregular vertical structure. Just the ground levels are still made of clinker brickwork. Meanwhile, its, partly sloping, finish imitates the silhouette and form of the roofing on the opposite side and still manages to create a further relation with its surroundings while also remaining independent.

Building project: Leipzig cogeneration plant | Façade design of the plant buildings
Client: Stadtwerke Leipzig, in cooperation with Fichtner GmbH
Invitation to tender 2020
Completion: 2023