Münster City Library
TYPOLOGY: Cultural
COUNTRY: Germany
CITY: Münster
YEAR: 1993
COMPETITION: 1987, First Prize
CLIENT: City of Münster
COLLABORATOR: Harms & Partner (in realization phase)
AWARDS: Mies van der Rohe Award 1995, Nomination
German Architecture Award 1995, Commendation
PHOTOS: © Christian Richters, Julia Cawley (update 2010)
The Münster Library was BOLLES+WILSON’s first major public commission. After more than ten years it remains near the top of Germany’s ‘library-user-ranking-list’. A verification not only of functionality but also of the attention to detail, to spatial multiplicity and to the ambience and atmosphere within.
The complexities of the overall building form are derived from internal organisation and from a careful re-constitution of the fragmented context. A new pedestrian street on the axis of the nearby Lamberti Church divides the not inconsiderable mass of the Library. This fissure in the library volume is closed with folded screens (copper outside, acoustically absorbing perforated wood panels within).
A transparent entrance zone (café, newspaper salon) leads via an information supermarket to the main information desk on the connecting bridge. This in turn is adjacent to book stacks in the ship-like outer volume. The atmosphere is quiet, studious. Books line the outer curved wall, a dramatic stair leads down through a 22 m void to the basement media library, which connects in turn to the courtyard facing children’s library and back up to the entrance zone. Up to four thousand users enter the Münster Library on one day.
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Münster City Library – Update 2010
With a newly painted facade and new automatic check out and 24-hour return automat the Münster City Library in its 18th year remains near the top of the German public library ranking list.
Blackburn House
TYPOLOGY: Residential
COUNTRY: UK
CITY: London
YEAR: 1987
PHOTOS © BOLLES+WILSON
No grand statement rather a series of practical opportunities. First the restructuring of the row of rundown Mews Houses into a new white box. A large window breaks through the white façade, the view is not good, the glass is opaque, blinded.
Ground floor office, a two floor apartment housing, a collection; Barry Flanagan (hare), Scott Burton (chair), Andy Warhol (portrait), Bruce McLean (table), Ron Arad (table), Jasper Morrison (sofa). Interior details are added to this list – supporting column and cantilevered balcony in steel, a vitrine, a floating boat – seat – handrail – individual narratives in a limited range of materials.
The upper floor with its 14 m skylight-wall functions as gallery, the lower lobby as chair hall. Sitting on the central barge seat the visitor has reached the vortex of the composition hovering like the house itself, not quite part of London.
VASARELY TOWER
RRUGA ALI PASHA GUCIA
TIRANA
FOR CHRISTIN INVESTMENTS 2025
CONCEPT
The theme of the Vasarely Tower design is derived from the hungarian pop artist Victor Vasarely who used simple geometric shapes and strong contrasting colours. The Vasarely Museum in Aixen-Provence interprets Vasarelys paintings as a building. For our proposal the horizontal museum becomes a vertical tower.
Within the loggia all surfaces and windowframes are coloured pink RAL 3014 (Vasarely colour contrast).
Suzuki House
TYPOLOGY: Residential
COUNTRY: Japan
CITY: Tokyo
YEAR: 1993
CLIENT: Akira Suzuki
AWARD: Goldmedal from Japanese Architects Institute 1994
PHOTOS: © Ryuji Miyamoto
A house as a large family room suspended in the city.
A house with a child’s room suspended within.
A house with two legs and a usable roof.
A house glanced by a passing Ninja (Impressed Shadow Façade).
Dub House
TYPOLOGY: Residential
COUNTRY: Germany
CITY: Munster
YEAR: 1993
PHOTOS: © BOLLES+WILSON
The principal element, a Blue Glazed Brick Wall corrects a disastrous alteration and also breaks the tyranny of uniform ceiling height.
The second added element, a Zinc Clad Studio Box stands adjacent the Blue Wall. The two set up an external and internal play – geometric volumes – the abstract language of the plan respected and developed.
A very modest commission, careful details with the potential of enhancing the everyday lives of their users.
