Pax building
| Pax building | |
|---|---|
|
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| Pax building from the west | |
| Basic data | |
| Place: | Basel |
| Construction time : | 1992-1997 |
| Opening: | May 26, 1997 |
| Status : | completed |
| Architectural style : | Modern |
| Architect : | Bürgin, Nissen, Wentzlaff |
| Use / legal | |
| Usage : | Administration building |
| Jobs : | about 400 |
| Main tenant: | Pax Swiss Life Insurance Company |
| Client : | Pax Swiss Life Insurance Company |
| Technical specifications | |
| Height to the roof: | 40.8 m |
| Top floor: | 35.3 m |
| Depth: | 14.9 m |
| Floors : | 8 + 3 |
| Usable area : | 6,740 m² |
| Floor area : | 12,370 m² |
| Enclosed space : | 43'760 m³ |
| Building material : | Steel , reinforced concrete , glass |
| address | |
| Address: | Aeschenplatz 13 |
| Post Code: | 4002 |
| City: | Basel |
| Country: | Switzerland |
The Pax building in Basel is the headquarters of the eponymous Pax Swiss Life Insurance Company . The eight-story, distinctive high-rise is 40.8 meters high and is the highest on the busy Aeschenplatz and is a well-known landmark there . It was built between 1992 and 1997 in two construction phases by the architects Bürgin, Nissen, Wentzlaff and replaced its predecessor, which is partly optically taken up.
history
Previous buildings
On August 1, 1926, the Pax Versicherungs-Gesellschaft, then still known as the Swiss Life Insurance Association (SLVV), acquired the Simon'sche Villa St. Alban-Anlage 13 at Aeschenplatz and relocated its headquarters from a building on the Address St. Johanns-Vorstadt 23 stood.
In 1950, the architects Bräuning, Leu and Düring built a four-storey front building to Aeschenplatz, which took account of the increased space requirements. A new wing was built for the St. Alban complex as early as 1947. In a further increase in 1970 the high-rise was expanded to eight floors and was ready for occupancy in 1971.
Today's house
In autumn 1987 the board of directors was presented with the plans for a further conversion and new building of the headquarters. In addition to the limited space available, the basis for the project was the poor economic efficiency of the existing buildings, an outdated communication network and building law requirements for tree protection . As part of an architectural competition , six Basel offices were invited to submit their designs for the planned building project. The renovation should be carried out while continuing operations. The winner of the competition on February 16, 1989 was the proposal by the architectural office Bürgin, Nissen, Wentzlaff, which was approved by the Board of Directors in January 1990. After the building application was submitted on June 27, 1991, the building project was granted approval on February 12, 1992.
On May 4, 1992, the first part of the construction work began with the demolition of the no longer needed parts of the building, so that on June 1, 1992 work on the shell could be started. This was ready for occupancy on August 29, 1994. The second construction phase and the demolition of further parts of the building began on October 10 of the same year. After this shell was erected on April 3, 1995, the building was completely occupied on May 26, 1997. The comparatively long construction time is due to the difficult circumstances of maintaining operations and the associated new construction in stages as well as the tight space available on Aeschenplatz.
description
location
The Pax building stands on a triangular, 2762 square meter property, which is bordered to the south by the St. Alban facility and to the north by Malzgasse. St Alban-Anlage and Malzgasse run towards the eastern Aeschenplatz at an acute angle. Accordingly, the Pax building consists of two building wings that run parallel to these streets. On the east side there is an open inner courtyard with a rich tree population. The St. Alban-Anlage and Malzgasse are connected to each other at the rear of the building via a public footpath, past the green inner courtyard.
Opposite the Pax building is the striking tower house , which was completed in 1929 on Aeschenplatz .
architecture
The hierarchically clear longest buildings of the Pax building are connected to Aeschenplatz by a dominant glass structure that curves towards Aeschenplatz. This stands in direct contrast to the two light gray clinker blocks. In the case of the two-layer glazed new building, a conscious decision was made not to follow the bend in Malzgasse. The spaces between the two layers of glass are criss-crossed by narrow maintenance walkways that are barely noticeable from the outside. The inner zones of the two wings are staggered towards the height behind the mural structures. At the head of the Pax building, a wide pedestrian area covered by the glass wing has been created. The cantilevered part is connected to the square with four thin columns. The front of the Pax building is around 61 meters long towards the St. Alban facility and around 67 meters long towards Malzgasse. The total height of the structure is 40.8 meters at the upper edge of the set-back supply storey. The perceptible roof edge on the street side is 35.3 meters. The three basement floors protrude up to 14.9 meters in depth. The flat roof of the building in the direction of St. Alban-Anlage is covered with plastic film and houses a maintenance basket for cleaning and repair work on the house facade, which is green in the direction of Malzgasse .
In the southern wing of the St. Alban-Anlage there is the stairwell on the western side, which is connected to the northern wing via the protruding glass part. On the west facade of the south wing, the Pax logo points in the direction of Aeschenplatz. Two passenger and one freight elevator connect the granite-lined entrance area on the first floor of the glass wing with eight above-ground and three underground floors of the house. Smaller staircases and lift cores are located at the ends in a north-easterly direction, in the two clinker tracts. Open break zones are set up at the intersection of the wings. In the two office wings, the offices face the streets. Towards the core, they are largely occupied by windowless side rooms. In the inner corner there are special rooms facing the garden, such as group offices and meeting rooms, which are usually more technically equipped.
Distribution, use and building services
In addition to the main entrance with revolving door to Aeschenplatz, there is a side entrance on Malzgasse. There is also the underground car park entrance and a loading bay for delivery traffic. The entrance hall is kept simple. To the left of the revolving door is a curved counter where the reception is located. On the right side there is some seating for those waiting. In the hall there is also rather discreet art on the building that corresponds to the history of the square.
The underground car park offers a total of 58 parking spaces for cars, 80 for bicycles and mopeds and 15 for motorcycles. Some of the parking lots are double parking spaces . The car park is also equipped with charging stations for e-bikes and electric vehicles. In addition to the underground car park, the basement floors are used for storage and archive rooms. In addition to the mandatory air raid shelters, there are shower and changing rooms for employees.
Of the total gross floor area, 12,370 square meters are in the above-ground and 6,670 square meters in the underground part of the building. The net usable area is divided into 6,740 square meters above ground and 1,770 square meters below ground. The above-ground cubic volume is 43'760 cubic meters, the underground 26'560 cubic meters. The Pax building was designed for around 400 workplaces. The depth of the offices is 4 to 6 meters, the room heights are 2.78 meters and the corridor width is 2.00 meters. Corridors and offices are laid out with 60 × 60 centimeter solid panels covered with carpet. The corridor ceilings are made of metal plates with built-in lights. The facade axis dimension is 1,375 meters, the column axis dimension 8.25 meters.
There is a central control system in the building with 3000 data points that manages all technical systems. The basic ventilation takes place via a double air exchange system. There is adiabatic summer air cooling in all offices . The system circulates up to 27,000 cubic meters of air. There is an air conditioning system with summer cooling in the special zones . The sixfold air exchanger works with speed-regulated fans and creates 17,000 cubic meters per hour. Another air conditioner is located in the data center . It works with two to five air exchangers and a convection cooler and circulates 3000 cubic meters of air per hour. The house has a district heating connection (550 kW), a heat recovery condenser (163 kW) and two buffer storage tanks with a total volume of 6 cubic meters. Two chillers and three cold water storage tanks each have an output of 151 kW and a total volume of 8.3 cubic meters. The building also collects rainwater, which is collected in an 80 cubic meter tank. This is used to flush the toilet facilities. The Pax building has two transformer stations, each with an apparent power of 600 kVA and a UPS system with a special 120 kVA battery. Almost 2000 sockets are installed throughout the house.
architectural art
The Pax building is artistically designed in various places . To this end, the two artist couples Teresa Hubbard / Alexander Birchler and Barbara Maria Meyer / Markus Gadient conceived corresponding projects, which should illustrate the architectural, urban historical and geographical dimensions of the location and reflect the current purpose of the building. The artistic design is rather inconspicuous and discreet.
Several white ash leaves embedded in the granite floor and the term “noon” come from Meyer / Gradient, since the ash is often associated with the tree of life and a connection with a life insurance company can be read as an allusion to the basic values. During their research into the naming of the Aeschenplatz, the artists came across the person of Eschemar, who is said to have acted as the guardian of the Eschemartor. The ash motif is not only found in the passage area in front of the main entrance; two trees were also planted on Malzgasse. Ash leaves can also be found in the entrance hall. They are shown as a small pile blown together in front of a large wall. The name of the person "Eschemar" is carved into the wall in capital letters . The inscription on the wall formally extends a fragment of an arch on the floor, alluding to the city gate and the city wall .
Not far from the pile of leaves, Hubbard / Birchler imitated a shadow on the wall that is supposed to reproduce the shadow cast by the former wall. The shadow level was calculated around noon on a specific date. The artistic shadow is overlaid by the actual one of the new building and on a roughly knee-high white cylinder-shaped pedestal stands a small bronze sculpture in front of the wall , which shows a folded checked cloth with salami, bread, fruit, knife and a wine bottle. The sculptural still life of the meal is an allusion to everyday and repetitive, timeless actions that can also be reminiscent of the gatekeeper Eschemar. When viewed from a distance, the reproduction looks deceptively real.
reception
The art and architecture historian Lutz Windhöfel described the Pax-building as a striking glass tower, which the rotunda of Mario Botta answer on Aeschenplatz. The stepped facade heights of the splayed V-shaped building resulted from the historical neighborhood. The boulevard side, on the other hand, contrasts with its new floors in a strict form. To the small-scale neighborhood in the north-west, which borders the historic old town, the height was reduced by three floors, thus creating a correspondence.
literature
- Pax Lebensversicherungs-Gesellschaft (Ed.): Das Pax-Gebäude , Basel 1997.
- Jürgen Wiegand: From value analysis to value management in: Swiss engineer and architect , Verlag-AG der academic technical associations, Zurich 1997, pp. 562–563. ( Digitized version )
- Pax Lebensversicherungs-Gesellschaft (Ed.): Review of the years 1876–2000 , anniversary publication of the Pax Lebensversicherungs-Gesellschaft, Basel 2000.
- Lutz Windhöfel : Architekturführer Basel 1980-2004 , A guide through the trinational city, Birkhäuser Verlag, 2004, ISBN 3-7643-7087-4 , No. 58.
Web links
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Leaves on the floor, letters on the wall - Contribution to the art of the Pax building:
- Part 1 ( Memento from September 4, 2018 in the Internet Archive )
- Part 2 ( Memento from November 28, 2018 in the Internet Archive )
Individual evidence
- ↑ Review of the years 1876–2000 , p. 5.
- ↑ Review of the years 1876–2000 , p. 25.
- ↑ Review of the years 1876–2000 , p. 7.
- ↑ Review of the years 1876–2000 , p. 9.
- ↑ Review of the years 1876–2000 , p. 15.
- ^ The Pax building , p. 2.
- ↑ a b c d e f The Pax building , p. 6.
- ↑ a b The Pax building , p. 3.
- ↑ a b The Pax building , p. 5.
- ^ The Pax building , p. 7.
- ↑ a b The Pax building , p. 8.
- ↑ basler-bauten.ch: Aeschenvorstadt , last accessed on November 16, 2017
- ^ The Pax building , p. 9.
- ↑ Windhöfel: Architectural Guide Basel 1980-2004 , no. 58.
