The perfect blend of tradition and modernity

Combining nine historic townhouses into a hotel complex is unquestionably a unique challenge. Two objectives moved to the forefront: the claim of historical monuments to restore the historical, sometimes very different facades and to preserve their autonomy, and combining the buildings to form a functioning hotel complex. In addition to dealing with “old and new”, the design-planning phase was dominated by clarifying one question: “How can the autonomy of the buildings be maintained while realizing their combination to a whole?”

Two of the original eleven historic buildings were demolished and replaced by new buildings. Another historical landmark building was restored to its original condition. The buildings partially lacked foundations and walls and ceilings were mostly non-load bearing. With great attention to detail, we approached the task to give new life to the old material and at the same time take into account the conservation requirements in terms of color and material as well as the preservation of historic components. The old buildings were completely gutted, and all beamed ceilings were replaced by reinforced concrete ceilings for soundproofing and fire-technical reasons. Since the floor heights of the historic houses vary widely, stairs and ramps had to be arranged at the transitions between the individual houses. Hence, together with the offset corridors of various houses this provides for an interesting tour of the hotel. Nevertheless, you do not lose the overview, because the lifts were laid out to ensure that there is always a reference to the inner courtyards and thus an orientation in the building.

Four courtyards with different qualities are obtained by linking two connecting buildings and a single-story hall inside the hotel complex. The new, subtly elegant facades are of modern design, with flush with the floor, light gray wooden windows and doors in different widths and with subdued balconies. The different profiles of the windows of individual old buildings were coordinated with historical conservation. Furthermore, the profiled sandstone balconies of historic buildings led to design challenges. For static reasons, they were replaced by precast reinforced concrete units according to historical patterns, the consoles, however, were largely preserved. In order to meet today's requirements, the historic railings were integrated in a new load-bearing framework in consultation with historic preservation.

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