supra office

Location: zürich
Year: 2001

supra office

office building conversion of the supra health insurance

Invited study commission, 1st price

The project was to design new offices for the headquarter of the health insurance supra in a historical protected building in Zurich. The house designed by the brothers Pfister in 1923 it is a important witness of the modernity and a landmark at Zurich’s Kornhausbrücke (bridge) next to the Limmatplatz.
Our concept leaves the whole structure of the protected historical building untouched and foresees two insertions to the site.
One is to create a new artificial horizon of light along the firewall (longest wall in the building) and therefore connect the two existing facades to one continuous screen of natural and artificial light.
The artificial screen can change it’s color to all different stages of weather or seasons. Like Monet painted the cathedral of notre dame not as an object, rather than as a reflection of colored light, depending of what time of the day and the weather, we dissolve the existing border of the firewall and give the impression of a endless space (horizon).
We call this phenomenon ‘émotions’ which stands for feelings, perception, mood and atmosphere of every day’s working life.
The second insertion is a new sculptural element, a mass, that grows through the whole building, in plan and section, containing all the office serving programs like; toilets, kitchen and conference room. The sculpture lies between the stairs and the office space. Precisely inserted light interstices tell of a misterious inner life and draw the lines between old and new structure (information).
The glass lift separates the washing area of the toilets from the stairways, functioning as a light source, ensuring the continuity of the façade and space all around.

On the top floor we had to divide the existing old attic with it’s typical wooden construction in two independent spaces and bring more natural light into it.
As the massive sculpture evolves to the top it generates a whole into the roof, trying to reach the sky. This provides a huge flat in the roof skin integrated skylight.
At the same time we cut through the space and the sculpture with a sharp glass membran , dividing the spaces in two and exposing the inner texture of the sculpture as a light up screen.
Along the joint of floor and ceiling we imposed a light interstice all along the space, again showing the old trace of the building and giving the impression of a almost free floating space inside the building, like an island in the water.
We reached a new spatial structure by the interaction of mass, the sculpture, and light, the horizon.