161B41
Alteration of Roche Bau 41, Basel
Architectural mandate in general planning team
Direct order
Client: F. Hoffmann-La Roche
Design and execution: 2014-2017
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A storage and logistics building designed and added on to several times by Roland Rohn, Building 41 on the Roche compound in Basel will be expanded further by an additional automated high-bay storage unit. Through a new building shell, the extension will be used to unify the volumes, which in ground plan are slightly staggered, thereby lending the building a stronger presence and to be compliant to the actual energy law. At the same time, the zone between the existing fabric of the compound and the new façade assimilates the additionally required vertical elements. The gleaming white façade set on top of a light concrete plinth, possibly materialized in glass ceramic with different degrees of gloss, is divided by four narrow, slightly recessed, and dark-appearing horizontal bands, which contain the windows of the office floors, and are articulated to distinguish the old from the new joints, or, as in the case of the uppermost strips, are different for technical reasons. In its modified state reaching a height of 40 m, the elegantly proportioned building, with its light-dark contrasting banding, maintains the long tradition of the image of the buildings on the Roche compound not only as a matter of course, but also in an independent way.