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University Centre of Applied Sciences
Rosenbergstrasse 59, St.Gallen
2003 - 2012
The
new building of the University Centre of Applied Sciences in the city
of St. Gallen, designed by Giuliani Hönger, is located at the foot of
the Rosenberg.
In immediate neighborhoud to the railway station, the University Centre, with its 65 m high tower, is like a landmark for travelers with its adequate representational appearance.
This excellent location is important for the University Centre, especially since it can be reached very well by public transport. Before the construction of
the new University Centre, the four disciplines of the university (health, social work, engineering and business) were spread across eight locations in the region.
Due to ever-increasing numbers of students it became necessary to merge the various departments in order to achieve synergies and simplifications.
For a long time, the excellent location was not a favored address, in the run-down houses between the railway tracks and the busy Rosenbergstrasse lived
the squatter scene of the city. In the meantime the area has changed and in the neighboring Lokremise building are housed a cinema, theater and a branch
of the Art Museum. The nearby Lokremise became some sort of a cultural hotspot that attracts visitors to this side of the tracks, with the new University Centre
this area becomes additionaly populated by many students.
In 2003, the architectural office Giuliani Hönger won the competition for the University Center of St.Gallen, among many participants. With a distinctive solitaire building,
establishing skillfull relationships to the different structures of the urban fabric, the architects were able to cope with the comprehensive program. The program was challenging,
because it asked not only for the various spaces of the university for teaching and administration, but also to solve some troubles in correlation with the railway station building,
which is located on the opposite side of the tracks. Individual and public transports resulted in ever growing traffic troubles on the station square. An underground car park,
and a bicycle park below the University Centre should largely disentangle the public and private transport. Moreover, it was prescribed in the program to transfer
the access way for the cars to the backside of the station. A few years later (2009) Giuliani Hönger also won the competition for the redesign of the station square.
So the office now has the opportunity to complete the connection to the other side of town. Unfortunately, the building remains provisionally incomplete in relation to
the urban integration. The forecourts in front and aside of the building still appeare loose. This only changes if the two additional buildings, which were proposed in the competition,
would be realized. These proposed volumes were part of the competition task and would create an urban ensemble, conecting the area better to the inner city.
These constructions would be able to define the exterior spaces and would make the exterior access ways appear more meaningful.
The ambiguous building consists of a horizontal volume with classrooms and a tower containing the Institute rooms. The horizontal base with the classroom fills the entire
available plot. With this artifice, the five-story base embeds in the immediate neighborhoud. On the south side the ground floor is recessed resulting in a roofed forcourt,
defining the main entrance and creating a relationship to the railway station. While the horizontal volume assumes the eaves height of the neighbouring edification and follows
the road alignment, the tower establishes a triad with the towers of the town hall and the main post office on the other side for the railway tracks. The tower conatinas the rooms
for the offices of the Institute, the faculty and the administration. From the outside of the base appears as a homogeneous and filled block. But after passing a compressed entrance area,
a glass ceiling allows to view and the tower its full size. In truth the compact-looking base is some kind of perimeter block development, which allows the architects
to receive daylight for the great depth of the building. The tower stands in the middle of the perimeter block, the narrow sides of the tower touch the stamped block and
connect it to an abstract eight. The smaller courtyard to the east is forming an open atrium above the glazed roof of the entrance area, while the larger court in
the west is completely roofed and includes the central hall of the three-storey library. The horizontal base and the tower relate to different urban structures, yet the building
is regarded as a coherent figure. A grid with a center distance of 250 cm governs the entire building and structures the façades, which consist of prefabricated and etched concrete
elements, uniting the different volumes of the figure. But there is also a refined differentiation, which is achieved by the different reliefing for base and tower. In ground floor,
featuring great ceiling heigts, the prefabricated elements rest directly on the ground and support the four classesroom stories, in which the horizontal façade elements protrude.
As a Consequence the base receives a distinct horizontal character and emphasizes the lying effect of the elevations with a lengt of up to 60 meters. In contrast,
the façade of the tower shows vertical concrete elements which are protruding. This emphasizes the vertical elements what makes the tower aspire even more to the height.
With its warm beige colour the concrete elements relate to the local building tradition and are reminiscent of the Savoy sandstone, which was traditionally often used in St. Gallen.
The floor plan shows corridors running around the two courtyards. Adjacent, in the outermost layer of the base, there are the classrooms, which benefit from natural daylight.
From the outside the building of the University Centre St.Gallen appears in a clear geometry, so that the irregular shape of the construction in the plan is quite surprising.
At colser inspection, the gridded facade uncovers different numbers of elements, which are the origin of the contorted geometry. This results in corners with acute
and obtuse angles in the interior - this makes the strictly gridded building vibrating. Just like the base the tower is anything but a rectangle, all sides have different edge lengths.
On three sides these assume the orientation of the base, while the tower tapers towards the north in favor of the neighboring buildings. All the different geometries
are skillfully interwoven, never giving the impression of geometrical interruptions.
In immediate neighborhoud to the railway station, the University Centre, with its 65 m high tower, is like a landmark for travelers with its adequate representational appearance.
This excellent location is important for the University Centre, especially since it can be reached very well by public transport. Before the construction of
the new University Centre, the four disciplines of the university (health, social work, engineering and business) were spread across eight locations in the region.
Due to ever-increasing numbers of students it became necessary to merge the various departments in order to achieve synergies and simplifications.
For a long time, the excellent location was not a favored address, in the run-down houses between the railway tracks and the busy Rosenbergstrasse lived
the squatter scene of the city. In the meantime the area has changed and in the neighboring Lokremise building are housed a cinema, theater and a branch
of the Art Museum. The nearby Lokremise became some sort of a cultural hotspot that attracts visitors to this side of the tracks, with the new University Centre
this area becomes additionaly populated by many students.
In 2003, the architectural office Giuliani Hönger won the competition for the University Center of St.Gallen, among many participants. With a distinctive solitaire building,
establishing skillfull relationships to the different structures of the urban fabric, the architects were able to cope with the comprehensive program. The program was challenging,
because it asked not only for the various spaces of the university for teaching and administration, but also to solve some troubles in correlation with the railway station building,
which is located on the opposite side of the tracks. Individual and public transports resulted in ever growing traffic troubles on the station square. An underground car park,
and a bicycle park below the University Centre should largely disentangle the public and private transport. Moreover, it was prescribed in the program to transfer
the access way for the cars to the backside of the station. A few years later (2009) Giuliani Hönger also won the competition for the redesign of the station square.
So the office now has the opportunity to complete the connection to the other side of town. Unfortunately, the building remains provisionally incomplete in relation to
the urban integration. The forecourts in front and aside of the building still appeare loose. This only changes if the two additional buildings, which were proposed in the competition,
would be realized. These proposed volumes were part of the competition task and would create an urban ensemble, conecting the area better to the inner city.
These constructions would be able to define the exterior spaces and would make the exterior access ways appear more meaningful.
The ambiguous building consists of a horizontal volume with classrooms and a tower containing the Institute rooms. The horizontal base with the classroom fills the entire
available plot. With this artifice, the five-story base embeds in the immediate neighborhoud. On the south side the ground floor is recessed resulting in a roofed forcourt,
defining the main entrance and creating a relationship to the railway station. While the horizontal volume assumes the eaves height of the neighbouring edification and follows
the road alignment, the tower establishes a triad with the towers of the town hall and the main post office on the other side for the railway tracks. The tower conatinas the rooms
for the offices of the Institute, the faculty and the administration. From the outside of the base appears as a homogeneous and filled block. But after passing a compressed entrance area,
a glass ceiling allows to view and the tower its full size. In truth the compact-looking base is some kind of perimeter block development, which allows the architects
to receive daylight for the great depth of the building. The tower stands in the middle of the perimeter block, the narrow sides of the tower touch the stamped block and
connect it to an abstract eight. The smaller courtyard to the east is forming an open atrium above the glazed roof of the entrance area, while the larger court in
the west is completely roofed and includes the central hall of the three-storey library. The horizontal base and the tower relate to different urban structures, yet the building
is regarded as a coherent figure. A grid with a center distance of 250 cm governs the entire building and structures the façades, which consist of prefabricated and etched concrete
elements, uniting the different volumes of the figure. But there is also a refined differentiation, which is achieved by the different reliefing for base and tower. In ground floor,
featuring great ceiling heigts, the prefabricated elements rest directly on the ground and support the four classesroom stories, in which the horizontal façade elements protrude.
As a Consequence the base receives a distinct horizontal character and emphasizes the lying effect of the elevations with a lengt of up to 60 meters. In contrast,
the façade of the tower shows vertical concrete elements which are protruding. This emphasizes the vertical elements what makes the tower aspire even more to the height.
With its warm beige colour the concrete elements relate to the local building tradition and are reminiscent of the Savoy sandstone, which was traditionally often used in St. Gallen.
The floor plan shows corridors running around the two courtyards. Adjacent, in the outermost layer of the base, there are the classrooms, which benefit from natural daylight.
From the outside the building of the University Centre St.Gallen appears in a clear geometry, so that the irregular shape of the construction in the plan is quite surprising.
At colser inspection, the gridded facade uncovers different numbers of elements, which are the origin of the contorted geometry. This results in corners with acute
and obtuse angles in the interior - this makes the strictly gridded building vibrating. Just like the base the tower is anything but a rectangle, all sides have different edge lengths.
On three sides these assume the orientation of the base, while the tower tapers towards the north in favor of the neighboring buildings. All the different geometries
are skillfully interwoven, never giving the impression of geometrical interruptions.