Description

In 2007, the architects Baumschlager Eberle, in collaboration with Christian Bauer, were the only team to propose a tower for the competition for the University of Luxembourg’s main lecture hall building in Belval. This was made possible by incorporating the second construction phase into the building, although its design was not explicitly part of the competition. The lecture halls are in one block while the entire university administration with the rector’s and matriculation offices are in the tower. Their idea convinced both the jury and the client, not least because one of the key objectives was to make a landmark building for the university at this location, which was formerly the site of a flourishing steel industry. The two old blast furnaces and a red bank building, completed seven years earlier to a design by Claude Vasconi, are visible from afar. The challenge the architects faced was to how place a new building in this architectural context.

They opted for a uniform raster skin covering the entire building that conceals the uses within and looks suitably industrial and robust. From outside, it looks more like a research site or a university computer centre. From close up and from inside, its grid construction made of extruded aluminium profiles (steel was too heavy) reveals an almost decorative and playful effect. This impression is heightened by the realisation that it is composed of two layers that are partially offset against one another, resulting in multi-storey moiré effects in the form of circular segments. This softens the rigorous rectilinearity of the grid of the facade, especially on the tower, but serves no specific functional purpose.

An important aspect was unhindered pedestrian permeability at ground level. One can walk directly from the building at the Place de l’Université in the north to the southern area with the Place de l’Académie at the former steel yard. One can alternatively follow the axial passage through the entire site or head to the blower hall in the southeast, built in 1911. This hall is the largest old building on the site but is at present still unused.

To achieve greater permeability, the architects raised the entire block of the Maison du Savoir off the ground. Separate entrances are arranged in the two “supports”. The “beam” of the building otherwise does without a support and cantilevers significantly at both ends. The structural system required to achieve these cantilevers can be seen from inside as diagonal struts in front of the windows and are more or less prominent depending on the direction of light. The concrete structure follows the principle of retensioning used in bridge building rather than pre-stressing. The thickness of the two load-bearing walls of the “beam” varies from 40 centimetres at the ends of the 180-metre-long “beam” to 100 centimetres above the “supports”. Walking along the corridors from one end of the building to the other, this change in thickness registers only as a slight curve to the corridor. The use of fire curtains made it possible to avoid the need for fire doors in the corridors.

The central teaching building serves the bachelor students of all faculties of the university. The entrance is a low, unassuming zone with an information counter and exhibition area from which escalators ascend in the centre in the room. They lead up to the levels with the lecture halls and seminar rooms. The five larger lecture halls (two with 240 seats, three with 150) are located in the middle section. The rooms in the sections on either side are subdivided by narrow illuminated intermediate zones.

The escalators also lead to the large hall with 750 seats in the basement, which can also be used for non-university events. In the second half of 2015, it was used during Luxembourg’s period of EU Council Presidency. The second, much smaller entrance area lies to the west and provides access to the tower and admin areas. The area of the entrance zone does not follow the floor plan of the tower, and this has the effect of undermining the specific quality and tension of the overall building composition.

Black curtains hang in the zones on the main level in front of the lecture halls extending over two floors. They are designed to be used by students to configure spaces that they can withdraw to for groupwork.

According to Dietmar Eberle, the Maison du Savoir is the first high-rise in Europe that does not require mechanical ventilation or air conditioning. Only the large lecture halls have corresponding ventilation systems. As such, the energy concept shares the same environmental goals as Eberle’s innovative office building in Lustenau.

Originally published in Bauwelt 05.2016, pp. 20-25, abridged and edited for Building Types online, translated by Julian Reisenberger

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