Viennese Chameleon

Chameleons are small lizards living in trees. They are most commonly known for their ability to change their outward appearance. The versatile reptiles have in more than one way been an inspiration for the project in Eichenstraße in Vienna’s 12th district, realized cooperatively with feld72. For example, with respect to its formal aesthetic: fit in between a parish church, a tram depot, and the railway tracks, six townhouses assemble into an organically meandering complex that defines an urban quarter with a point-block head building (used as a hotel). Or as a public park: the treetop-level garden spreads between and below the houses, providing the green lung of a, metaphorically speaking, colorful habitat. And, finally, in reference to the much-quoted adaptability of the color-changing animals: with varied urban plinths, the concaved built volumes are able to equalize the site’s massive grade differential (no less than nine meters) in a, literally, light-footed manner. The positioning of the townhouses responds to the givens of the site with, as it were, both sensitivity (in the transition zone to the surrounding area) and confidence (as a landmark in the grown urban silhouette). The plinth floors provide supply and service facilities, accommodating, for example, an event center, the hotel lobby and commercial areas. Entrances and accessways to hotel, residential, and services areas are located at the elevated-park level. The first three floors of the townhouses are conceived as multiuse areas. All residential units have private outdoor areas, ideal daylighting, and maximized views. The facades, folded and with multiple different light reflexes depending on the incident angle, create an impression of variegated urbanity. Gently positioned to one another, the coved buildings present themselves as an intriguing array of multiply and collectively usable interstitial spaces. In the spirit of a Musilean sense of possibility (The Man without Qualities), AllesWirdGut and feld72 have created an open and transparent development in Vienna’s Eichenstraße which mainly holds one promise: new perspectives. Of an emergent new neighborhood. In an urban quarter that is about to take root.

Architecture: AllesWirdGut + feld72 Client: 6B47 Real Estate Investors AG + Trivalue Management GmbH + Soravia Group GmbH

Competition: Sept. 2019 — 1st prize GFA: 80.000 m²

Team AllesWirdGut: Alessandro Capetti, Charlotte Großmann, Cristina Vlascici, Felix Reiner, Katarzyna Marcol, Teresa Aćimović