Kalkbreite / Müller Sigrist Architekten

Architects: Müller Sigrist Architekten
Location: Zurich, Switzerland
Lead Architects: Müller Sigrist Architekten AG
Area: 22900.0 m2
Project Year: 2014
Photographs: Martin Stollenwerk, Michael Egloff

Construction Management: B&P Baurealisation, Zürich
Civil Engineer: Dr. Lüchinger und Meyer, Zürich
Building Physics: BWS Bauphysik AG, Winterthur
Color Design: Jörg Niederberger
Landscape Architecture: Freiraumarchitektur GmbH
Clients: Housing cooperative Kalkbreite (live-work-complex), City of Zürich (tram depot)

Text description provided by the architects. The residential and commercial complex with integrated tram depot stands at a prominent point marking the boundary between two city districts. It combines residential, service and commercial uses in an identity-lending, large but compact form.

A cascade of access points links indoors and outdoors, walkable roofs and a courtyard above the tram depot. The building complex contains 88 flats, »joker spaces« that can be added on, various communal areas as well as cultural, catering, retail and service premises for 256 residents and providing 200 jobs. Kalkbreite hence offers new and flexible forms of living and working, serving as a model for cooperative living in the city.

The complex was built according to the energy and ecology targets of the 2000-watt society and meets the Minergie-P-Eco standard. The seven-storey building is a hybrid construction with a façade of prefabricated wood elements. The plaster walls of the polygonal perimeter block development dazzle in colours ranging from orange to turquoise.