5TH FLOOR new building footprint covers as much of the site as possible . Importantly , part of the street frontage on Fredman Drive is built up to the boundary line , giving the entire ensemble a distinct presence .
Existing
Cutting through existing
New
2ND FLOOR
1ST FLOOR
GROUND FLOOR
Design Given the method of original construction , the existing façade and servicing concept proved itself to be unsuitable for integration into a new design . The entire structure was stripped ‘ to the bone ’, and all façade elements removed .
Starting with a rational parking grid that runs vertically through the building , the initial exercise was the replacing of the lower office floors by parking . The lost rentable area was then added on top of the building and in a separate annex building to the north .
The northern annex is formed in an almost billboardlike fashion as an off-shutter wall hovering above street level , with a ‘ picture window ’ cut into it which carries the terraces of the canteen areas behind .
The two-storey structure is topped by an intensively planted roof garden , designed in an almost Brazilian decorative geometry . In what is fast becoming a bamboo forest three floors above street level , walls of vertical planting hug intimate seating areas and create dramatic sheltered outside rooms . The combination of soft and feathery planting and the angular forms of the concrete walls make for a striking and unusual appearance . The entire roof garden has been designed as the proverbial ‘ fifth façade ’, made for the eyes looking down onto this roof from the offices above .
While the new annex structures have a predominantly horizontal linear articulation , they are balanced by the prominent and overstated vertical glass half-cylinder attached to the western end of the main office wing . This cylinder is topped by a semi-circular roof projecting from slender round steel columns . At night , the glass cylinder is internally lit to reveal , more strongly than during the day , a filigree pattern of white lines marked in baked ceramic coating onto the round glass surfaces . Additional parking decks , extending from the existing parking and office levels on the south side of the building , push up against the southern boundary of the site . These are accessed by means of a new ramp system in the eastern corner of the site , all but hidden from view from the street .
The new building design provides for a generous and prominent new entrance to the building from the southern side . The new entrance is positioned on the south side , flanked by a battered waterfall that hides the remaining basement parking decks . Thin precast concrete stairs on a spine beam rise up from the driveway to bring visitors onto a raised platform partly enclosed by folded off-shutter concrete walls . These concrete walls shield the
50 22 Fredman Drive