Julian Breinersdorfer Architecture : Factory Berlin

Livrée en Juillet 2014, la "Factory Berlin" est une pépinière d’entreprise et de Start-up qui vient s’installer dans une ancienne brasserie berlinoise. Imaginé par l’agence Julian Breinersdorfer Architecture, ce projet de restructuration très ambitieux accueille désormais des entreprises à la pointe telles que Twitter ou Soundcloud.

Sur 10.000 m², le projet donne une nouvelle jeunesse à ce lieu riche en histoire et dont les 5 bâtiments disctincts furent érigés entre la fin du 19ème siècle et le début du 20 ème. La Oswald Berliner Brewery se situait à la frontière que constituait le Mur de Berlin. Depuis la chute du mur en 1989, ce complexe a abrité des habitations, des entreprises, et a servi d’entrepôt. Afin de préserver ce monument chargé d’histoire, les architectes ont avant tout cherché à rendre à ses façades leur aspect d’avant-guerre. La façade de briques d'origine s’est dévoilée tout en étant retravaillée pour respecter les exigences environnementales très strictes en Allemagne. Deux étages ont par ailleurs été ajoutés à cette construction qui n’est comptait que 3. Les nouveaux volumes, aléatoires, surplombent l’existant et évoquent petit village.

Sur ce projet, l’agence Julain Breinersdorfer précise :

"Factory Berlin is a 10.000m² start-up campus in Berlin Mitte, home to Twitter, Soundcloud and 6Wunderkinder. The campus is hosted by Google.

The main building, formerly the Oswald Berliner Brewery, was once a part of the Berlin Wall; the third floor windows facing what was once West Germany served as outlooks for the prying eyes of GDR watchmen. Since the Mauerfall in 1989, the complex has been home to an agglomeration of small businesses, housing, and storage facilities akin to the walled city of Kowloon. In the basement, we discovered the subterranean party den of the Nigerian ambassador to the GDR.

The Oswald Berliner Brewery structure consists of five distinct building parts, built at different times ranging from the late-19^th to the early-20^th century.

To highlight the beauty and integrity of the original structure, we aimed to recreate the pre-World War I facade as accurately as possible, as hardly any historical photos or original plans exist. The removal of the plaster cladding to reveal the original brick facade was a tricky undertaking due to strict German regulations regarding climate protection. The circulation and spatial logic were manipulated to satisfy the requirements of a 21^st century start-up landscape. The offices of the internet company Soundcloud, for example, occupy formerly separate building parts and floor levels that were laced together with open internal staircases, creating a continuous spatial system connecting three floors of office program.

The addition of the new fourth and fifth floors demanded a careful response to the distinct structural and spatial properties of the old building parts. Thus, the design process for the two top floors can be best described as a cat lying down on a rugged stone wall, shifting and turning until it finds a suitably comfortable position for an afternoon nap.

The resulting topography forms a village-like arrangement of white volumes, which are home to clusters of small start-ups, gathered around a central outdoor plaza on the fifth floor.

The ground floor hosts co-working spaces and a restaurant, and is open to the campus courtyards, gardens, terraces, and event spaces in the basement.

The basement of Factory Berlin consists of distinct, multipurpose areas including 400m² halls and circular brick spaces, which were once occupied by massive round oil tanks. The complex subterranean program has been optimized to allow full indoor-outdoor event circulation."

Photographies : Werner Huthmacher 

Pour en savoir plus, visitez le site de Julian Breinersdorfer Architecture.