Description

The Am Horn development in Weimar, launched in 1996, is a unique new inner-city housing estate project for Germany. A binding development plan was fixed after an open competition for this former barracks plot. The terrain extends above the Ilmaue and Georg Muche’s Haus am Horn Bauhaus show house and includes some existing buildings that have to be retained. The three winners of the first prize, Diener & Diener, Snozzi and Krischanitz, were asked to work together, and produced the ultimately valid plan under the overall control of Adolf Krischanitz.

As well as restoring and converting the building stock on the periphery, they decided on a development structure ‘in the spirit of the Bauhaus for the desolate site. This was intended to form a link with the prestigious work done by the Bauhaus, so important for the 20th century, at its first location in Weimar. What ultimately emerged was a powerful structure of orthogonal parcels permitting open, i.e. distanced, and closed, i.e. linking, development. Greater density was required in the centre, a double access road with underground car-park, and on the outer streets, while a more open style of development was planned for the inner areas. Fundamentally, a constant change of parcel size was to produce buildings of different dimensions, but also a social mix, linked with the idea of a ‘garden city’ with continuous planting, or better, a municipal garden.

Few recent housing estate projects have been realized with such consistency of structure and form as Am Horn in Weimar. In the spirit of the Bauhaus, the overall architectural language was to use a reduced cubic construction mode with flat roofs. This would unify the area, avoiding individual extravagances for the sake of integrated appearance.

The architect Karsten Bauer’s home is on a long, narrow parcel in the middle of the estate, with other buildings on both sides. The simple cubature of a narrow rectangular block is placed at the beginning of the plot, making a relatively large space available for the garden beyond. The spatial disposition is generally tight, but the architect transforms the main entrance area into a lavish ‘entrée’: a continuous light courtyard, built into the outline of the building, becomes a gateway and entrance hall for visitors. Framing openings, two storeys high, establish a link with the outside world, escaping the confinement of the parcel. Inside, the architect also opens the access corridor on to the hallway via a diagonal wall on the ground floor, so that it seems possible to ‘live right through’ from the study by the street to the garden.

The building opens up generously on to the garden. Smooth white rendering produces clear lines and contrasts with the black window frames and railings. On the garden façade, Bauer makes the floor division, also in black, shift discreetly back and the glass façade behind it, the width of the passage, does so even more clearly, so that the framing section of the building underlines the two-storey quality. This generous gesture identifies the most important communicative spaces, which are located here: the cooking and dining area on the ground floor, with their invitingly open character, and the actual living area on the top floor, next to the bedrooms. A sunny loggia gives the living room a link with the outside world and an extensive view. Subtle refinement plays down the restricted plot and the abstract form of the building, so that the simple block becomes a three-dimensional structure that is rich in tension.

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Originally published in: Klaus-Peter Gast, Living Plans: New Concepts for Advanced Housing, Birkhäuser, 2005.