Discover Germany | Special Theme | All Eyes on German Architecture 2019Move Management
HAHN+KOLB new headquarters.
The dissolution of boundaries Award-winning concepts and a mind for future-orientated living and work environments make Sigrid Hintersteininger a visionary on the research front as well as in her creative work. TEXT: CORNELIA BRELOWSKI I PHOTOS: DAVID FRANCK
In cooperation with selected companies and planning partners, the office aims at developing innovative, socially and energetically sustainable concepts for both solitary buildings and urban quarters. The architect started out with her very own dissertation paper which has informed her work profoundly from the start. Her 2006 thesis title translates as Living Without Boundaries – the Creative Class in Times of Media. In it, she explored what kind of spaces and urban settings nurture a special type of social group in our era of information, namely the new media personality, promoting a boundary-less working and living environment while at the same time allowing individual decision-making processes. But what, in the essence, makes a space lose its original ‘determination’ and opens it to a concept of optional choice? The an84 | Issue 73 | April 2019
swer (and the result of the research) is the realisation of a new type of demarcation of space in our era of information, which entails the option of choice within various multiple-coded spaces, rooms and selected areas. For the Roto company’s creative centre, for example, a multifunctional, open space of 1,600 square metres on two levels was planned which gets divided through wooden boxes and an atrium. This room-in-room system enables flexible working so that each employee gets the opportunity to choose their surroundings themselves. The architect founded her office Sigrid Hintersteininger Architects SHA in Stuttgart in 2007 and has since worked on multiple planning projects as well as architectural assignments. Several competition wins made it possible for the
team to realise high-quality office and commercial spaces as well as housing projects, always implementing the concept of optional choice for both work and living spaces within a diverse urban environment. Each project gets developed alongside the client, while the client’s corporate identity gets taken into account. For example, the new headquarters of HAHN+KOLB from Sigrid Hintersteininger Architects were planned with a view to a design vocabulary that embodies dynamics. To the team, the triangle of architectural theory, research and practice remains an important basis for inspiration, as it creates room for experimentation to explore and implement new spatial concepts, innovative materials and contents. Clients value the open-minded, future-orientated aesthetics of Sigrid Hintersteininger Architects’ awardwinning projects, executed with a sense of both joy and structure. www.sigridhintersteininger.net