Contributor
HGA Arhitektuur

2009
Rotermann Old and New Flour Storage - Tallinn - Estonia

The 1,5 century-old Rotermann Quarter, a former industrial area for food production, is located between the Tallinn‘s old town and the port.
The masterplan with its main square and street grid was design by Alver Arhitektid in 2006. The approved detail planning calls for adoptive reuse of existing buildings as well as insertion of new volumes amongst to create “live-work” city right at the center of Tallinn with people-friendly environment; and the new flour storage was aimed to form a plaza as a new focal point of the quarter.
The project consists of three volumes; the Old Flour Storage with 2 additional stories, the New Flour Storage and the Atrium connecting the two. Ground floor is for retail and all upstairs are for offices.
The approach was to relate and strengthen the character of historical quarter through finding and adopting the character of the surroundings.
The Old and new flour storage doubles the existing historic building with a coarse and rough architectural language expressed in windows proportions and the use of rusty corten steel panels on the facades intended to relate to the industrial history of the site.
For facade they have abstracted proportion of wall versus window openings; limestone walls, brick lintels and rusted steel details that pay homage to the area’s industrial past.
The new building is erected next to the old one and the two are interconnected by a glass-roofed atrium. On top of the pitched roof of the old limestone building, two additional floors are added with similar window's rhythm and floor height structure but with a different wall covering; and also the roof shape is to refer to the roof of the old existing building. The floor heights of 3.4m and 4.6m are rather high for standard office use but decided to refer to the atmosphere of the existing floors. The renovation work has been done to restore original window openings.
The glass-roofed Atrium is to become „air“ sandwiched in-between. The bridges functionally connect the two for lift access as well as for evacuation route.

[project selected by Gloria Mazzucchelli]

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Architecture as Resource / Imprint