bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_entrance

BP Lingen Administrative and Service Centre

Detail

TYPOLOGY: Office / Laboratory
COUNTRY: Germany
CITY: Lingen
YEAR: 2019
CLIENT: BP Europe Lingen
PHOTOS: © Roman Mensing

On September 20th 2019 the new BP Lingen ‘Lighthouse Project’ officially opened. Such a fast track project with six months planning and one year construction time required focussed and co-ordinated teamwork from architects and contractors (Hofschröer/Mainka, Lingen).

The new building at a safe distance from the refinery (technicians cycle back and forth) is nestled in a pine forrest and houses administration, laboratories, workshops and a BP fire station (with training tower).

The BOLLES+WILSON design manifests BP’s ‘One Team’ philosophy. Open plan offices on three levels surround a spectacular light filled atrium. Animated by ‘team oriented break-out spaces’, this communicative heart of the complex is crowned by a pyramid of triangular pneumatic pillows. An illuminated lighthouse that hovers above treetops, in dialogue with the nearby refinery.

Vertical sun louvers across the office and fire station facade echo BP logo colours as does the colourful and dynamic interior landscape.

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'Lighthouse' at nighttime
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Façade with vertical sun louvers
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Façade detail
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Foyer
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bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_hall with pneumatic roof
Atrium as the communicative heart of the building
bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_hall with pneumatic roof
Pneumatic roof
bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_hall with pneumatic roof
bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_hall with pneumatic roof
bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_office area
Office area
bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_office area
bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_office area
bp lingen administrative and service centre_lingen_roman mensing_office area
city hall, korca new municipality, albania

City Hall Korça

Detail

TYPOLOGY: Public

COUNTRY: Albania

CITY: Korça

YEAR: 2019

PHOTOS: © Roman Mensing, Olgert Maxhe, BOLLES+WILSON

1) The conversion of the communist library on Bulevard Shën Gjergji was a parallel project to the construction of the (BOLLES+WILSON) New Library facing the new Cathedral Square. – These are all pieces of the puzzle that adds up to the BOLLES+WILSON Masterplan for the centre of the city of Korça.

2) The re-design introduced a new balcony to synthesise a previously uncomfortable Junction of marble columns and the white box upper floor. The perforated balustrade facilitates victorious football teams or the mayor addressing his public.

3) The four large windows to the balcony received new sliding sun screens. We are here only a stone’s throw from the BOLLES+WILSON 2014 Red Bar in the Sky.

4) The communist library was on the site of a demolished church – the façade geometry of this absent building had already been embossed into the paving (rotated on its ground line) with the pedestrianizing of Boulevard Shën Gjergji (BOLLES+WILSON Masterplan stage 1). This embedded history is now to be read in lasered text in Albanian (black on white) or English (white on black) on the new entrance ramp wall (the axis of rotation for the reanimated church geometry).

5) The old library interior is emptied for a spacious ‘one stop shop’ (public information). Here existing tiles and the wide span coffered ceilings are thematized (colour + integrated air outlets), the existing theatrical stairs gets a pink backdrop with scattered windows. (6+7)

6) Here existing tiles and the wide span coffered ceilings are thematized (colour + integrated air outlets).

7) The existing theatrical stairs gets a pink backdrop with scattered windows.

8) Part of the entrance level floor was removed for a stair that leads down to the new council chamber.

9) White public information islands are divided from individual offices by a lightweight glass wall.

10) Dividing – the council chamber from the Lobby. A translucent screen of green wine bottles was inserted between existing structural beams.

11) The floor slab removed for the council chamber creates a grand salon for political debate. Councillors desks are white, the visitors balcony pink (12+13)

14) Wine bottles set in mortar give an underwater ambience to council chamber.

15) Their open necks function as acoustic absorbers.

16) Councillors’ benches focus on the mayor’s desk, this is backed by a wooden screen with the double eagle Albanian national symbol.

17) Our client, the mayor Sotiraq Filo

18) A high clearstory window lights from the side

19) Next door to the new city hall an existing building (nineteenth century eclecticism) has been carefully restored for the offices of the mayor and his staff. It connects directly to the council chamber via a submerged tunnel (steps above). (19)

20) Within the mayors building – no architectural interventions were needed. It only remained for BOLLES+WILSON to apply a radical polychromy. (20,21,22,23)

city hall, korca new municipality, albania
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania, Peter Wilson, drawing sketch
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania
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city hall, korca new municipality, albania, sketch drawing, Peter Wilson
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bibliotheque nationale du luxembourg_bnl_luxemburg_christian richters_main facade

BnL Bibliothèque nationale du Luxembourg

Detail

TYPOLOGY: Cultural
COUNTRY: Luxemburg
CITY: Luxembourg (Kirchberg)
YEAR: 2023
COMPETITION: 2003, 1st prize
GFA: 38.200 sqm
CLIENT: Le Gouvernement du Grand-Duché de Luxembourg / Ministère de la Mobilité et des Travaux publics
COLLABORATOR: cooperation with local office: WW+ architektur + management sàrl (tender + construction management)
AWARD: 2021 DAM Prize for Architecture in Germany, category Buildings Abroad (Shortlist)
PHOTOS: © Christian Richters
PHOTOS MODEL: © Tomasz Samek
PHOTOS CONSTRUCTION: © Administration des bâtiments publics / Bibliothèque nationale du Luxembourg + BOLLES+WILSON

The task of the Patrimonial and Universal Library is the housing and protection of Cultural and Intellectual Texts – a foundation stone of the intellectual community. For the BnL a compact, energy efficient building volume houses a wide range of functional entities.
A transparent imposing, but at the same time inviting, facade fronts onto the Avenue John F. Kennedy. Internal functions unfold sequentially from this entrance gesture; Foyer +, Café (with upper level conference + seminar rooms), next the Reading Room – a landscape of terraced workstations and bookshelves. The principle building block is located deep within the building, a central and compact archive over five levels. This secure core is encased by public spaces and forms a plateau on top of which the largest bookshelf area and reading-deck is found.
The principle facade material is large format red pre-cast concrete panels – a patchwork due to a variety of surface treatments (water/sand-jeting, acid washing). The architectural intention is homogeneity, a material unity of the overall building volume, with an undercurrent of surface articulation. The archive plateau is encased in a bastion-like wrapping of stone-filled Gabion cages. Planning prioritized energy efficiency; technical installations take second place in favour of an activating of the buildings thermal mass to engender a sustainable interior climate.

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bibliotheque nationale du luxembourg_bnl_luxemburg_christian richters_entrance
View from Ave. John F. Kennedy
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Intarsia on the entrance façade
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Entrance as a funnel
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South façade
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Façade detail and archive behind gabion wall
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Foyer
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Foyer with staircase
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Main reading hall
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bibliotheque nationale du luxembourg_bnl_luxemburg_christian richters_main reading room
bibliotheque nationale du luxembourg_bnl_luxemburg_christian richters_upper reading deck
Upper reading deck
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bibliotheque nationale du luxembourg_bnl_luxemburg_christian richters_special reading room
Special reading room
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Seminar room
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Aerial view
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Siteplan
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Ground floor
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Model
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Aerial view of the construction site
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bibliotheque nationale du luxembourg_bnl_luxemburg_construction

RS+Yellow Furniture

Detail

TYPOLOGY: Retail

COUNTRY: Germany

CITY: Münster

YEAR: 2003

GFA: 7.700 sqm

CLIENT: Rainer Scholze

AWARDS: Award for Exemplary Corporate Architecture in NRW 2004

PHOTOS: © Christian Richters

‘A staging of shopping’. The widespan shop outlet typology usually situated on the periphery is here reconstituted as an urban facade, city near and addressing the city bound / city exiting traffic. Three stores (RS, Yellow, Brands) with an overall shop area of 5.000 m2 cluster with warehouse and delivery bays, around an internal parking piazza. An advertising tower erupts on one corner, a supersign, a new actor in the quartier’s tower landscape (Trinity Church and Fire Station Tower).

A theatrically proportioned roof frames the pedestrian/car entrance. This transition space is a constructed perspective (rejecting any ideal viewing point), a reciprocal scenographic framing of inner and outer world. The hovering roof grows out of and connects the two larger shops. Logistics are critical – 18 m long lorries cross the piazza and disappear into the building.

The exaggerated scale of the wooden window frames in RS (which sells wooden furniture) are stacked like boxes (These 35 cm wide frames sidestep a local building regulation that prohibits wooden facades on retail structures). A dialogue between contained and container that continues in the interior detailing. Both structure (prefabricated concrete) and the materiality (fibre-cement panels) of the facades respond with an economic and systemized appropriateness to the ‘outlet’ building type.

RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster, christian Richters
RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster
RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster
RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster, Lageplan, plan
RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster, floorplan
RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster, model, Modell
RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster, model, Modell
RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster, model, Modell
RS Yellow Naturholzmöbel, Münster, model, Modell
Monteluce Quarter_Perugia_Masterplan_Model

Monteluce Quarter

Detail

TYPOLOGY: Masterplan / Mixed Use / Landscaping

COUNTRY: Italy

CITY: Perugia

YEAR: 2006 – 2015

COMPETITION: Invited Competition 2006, First Prize

CLIENT: BNL Fondi imobiliari SGR p.A. / Fondo Umbria – Monteluce Unit / BNP Paribas REIM SGR p.A.

AWARDS: Premio Urbanistica 2007 (category Quality of Public Spaces), Italian National Institute of Urban Planning

CONSTRUCTION PHOTOS: © BNP

MONTELUCE MASTERPLAN

On 12th sept. 2006 the office of Bolles+Wilson was awarded the first prize in the International Design Competition for Monteluce in Perugia.

The jury lead by Axel Sowa, director of “Architecture d’ aujourd’hui” commended the winning entry for its respect and sensitivity to the scale of Monteluce, its morphological compatibility with the historic structure of Perugia and its sympathetic relationship to the surrounding Umbrian landscape.

The Convento delle Clarisse of S. Maria di Monteluce originating in 1218 stands outside the Etruscan walls of Perugia, an outpost protecting one of the main access roads. Expansion outside the medieval walls reached Monteluce at the end of the nineteenth century. A concurrent appropriation of religious assets by the State instigated the opening of a gate to the Piazza Monteluce and between 1910 and 1923 the construction in the monastery garden of a series of hospital pavilions.

The Competition Program developed in close co-operation with the Commune di Perugia called for a total of 65,000 sqm – 43% of which is student and private housing and 25% subsidised housing. The new urban Quartier is networked in terms of a continuity of urban spaces and a rich programmatic mix including a maximum of 10% retail and 5% office use as well as hotel and conference facilities, local health offices, kindergarten and a new public park.

The Bolles+Wilson design developed and presented in 1:500 model format rejects authoritative geometry in favour of a sequencing of localised responses tailored to the dramatic topology and framed views out and across the luxurious Umbrian landscape. For economy and continuity many new structures occupy the footprint of redundant hospital buildings, a strategy that preserves the extensive terraced system of retaining walls and protected trees.

Bolles+Wilson describe their scheme as Urban Choreography, a sequence of public spaces unfolding from the S.Maria di Monteluce church in the west to the new Park d’Este. A first Piazza is framed by the Monestry portico and the one remaining Hospital Pavilion (Public Health Offices). To the north are offices and a submerged supermarket. To the south a Hotel and Conference Pavilion frame the view in the direction of Assisi. A second Conical Piazza is enclosed by a row of student housing buildings to the north and an opposing commercial/ restaurant Acropolis. Here deck- like upper terraces offer spectacular views of the historic skyline and Umbrian landscape.

MONTELUCE QUATTRO

The core of the new urban quarter became the (architectural) responsibility of BOLLES+WILSON (see siteplan). In realization it follows very closely the competition proposal of two Piazzas on the crest of the hill/ridge, underneath these two levels of carparking ensure car free public spaces (500 cars disappear underground). The strategic placement of these two Piazzas follows the typical Perugian trope of leaving one side of a space open for cooling winds and views out across the sensuous and gently rolling Umbrian landscape (views across the valley to Assisi).

The strategy of two piazzas introduces a spatial sequence resulting from the integration of the historic monastery and the12th century chapel – their arched entrance portal announces the entry to the first new Piazza, now named Piazza Cecilia Coppoli (1426-1500, poetess and humanist) and opened on 19th March 2015 by Catiusca Marini – President of the Region of Umbria. Signora Marini described the Monteluce spaces as ‘an investment in the culture of the city, also in the public patrimony of Perugia, an exemplary work and graceful urban transformation, one that experiments with a new contemporary urban architecture.’

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Monteluce Quarter_Perugia_Masterplan_Lageplan_Masterplan_Siteplan
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