Goldammerweg, Cologne

BACK TO THE FUTURE. THE BAUHAUS TRADITION AND CLINKER BRICK SLIPS MERGE TO CREATE EXCLUSIVE SUSTAINABLE RESIDENTIAL ARCHITECTURE.

The Cologne district of Junkersdorf is synonymous with elegant single-family homes built in the Bauhaus style in the 1920s. Since that time, the district has attracted people due to its exclusive feeling of living in a leafy area of the city – and now acts as a „home port“ for many celebrities from TV or elite sports. The area offers potential for new buildings due to the large plots of land. For example, two multi-family houses with 16 exclusive freehold apartments with 85 to 180 m2 of living space have been built on Goldammerweg on a 3,850 m2 plot of land previously occupied by a single family house. Today, two 1,000 m2 buildings blend harmoniously into the surrounding single-family housing. To give the ensemble a lighter feel, the designers optically divided the individual sections of the building by offsetting them and connecting them with glazed staircases.

With clear design language and a high-quality, timeless choice of materials, the architects drew on the district‘s Bauhaus tradition. For the facade, the investor wanted a high standard of thermal insulation and a permanent solution with low maintenance costs. Thus, an ETICS system with rock wool insulation and a shell made of clinker brick slips was created. The facade of the building complex needed to have a high-quality, exclusive appearance, so the designers deliberately chose a brick slip with a slim, long format and unconventional colouring. „The product, „Stiltreu“ from Ströher in a silver-grey used look, with its long, thin bar format of 490 x 40 mm and its slightly nuanced, rough surface, perfectly matched our ideas about brick format and brick surface“, explains Thomas Kostulski of Kostulski Architekten, about the choice of material.

The silver-grey clinker brickwork gives the building complex a strikingly modern, yet timelessly elegant appearance over the whole facade area of 1,200 m2. The monolithic effect of the building is a result of its design and installation finesse. Despite a joint ratio of approx. 30% and installation of the brick slips in a random offset pattern, a uniform surface effect was achieved by using a colour-coordinated, specially mixed grout. The facade design with „Stiltreu“ brick slips from Ströher is an exemplary showcase – because it is timelessly beautiful, energy-efficient, permanently weather-resistant and maintenance-free.