Raiffeisen Finance Center

Raiffeisen Finanz Center 10
Raiffeisen Finanz Center 01

The design of the building playfully responds to the restrictions imposed by the building regulations as well as to the schedule of accommodation for the different floors, and develops an encasing figure that encloses all the activities of the bank in a continuous form.

Year

2006

Venue

Eisenstadt

State

Completed

Category

Work

Size

2561 m²

Year

Venue

State

Category

Size

2006

Eisenstadt

Completed

Work

2561 m²

Year

2006

Venue

Eisenstadt

State

Completed

Category

Work

Size

2561 m²

Continuity of intuition

The continuity of the building envelope conveys a sense of identity to both staff and customers, while the building’s volumetric shaping ensures it a striking role in the appearance of the town. It is made of aluminium sandwich panels whose colouring might awaken associations with coins or the bank’s corporate identity. Narrow window openings at calculated positions in the facades respond to the need to screen people who work at computers from glare.

Raiffeisen Finanz Center 02

Unusual, but functional

This basic idea – quoted from the explanatory report that accompanied the competition entry – was deepened and developed further. To the east and the west the building is encased in a metallic facade made of Alucobond panels that is perforated by windows arranged in a specially developed layout. This layout allows unfamiliar views outside, but also offers the staff an almost intimate work atmosphere and provides protection against glare for those working at computers.

Raiffeisen Finanz Center 06
Raiffeisen Finanz Center 05
Raiffeisen Finanz Center 04

The amount of glazing is based on guidelines on lighting for work places. This allows a large area of solid wall which, thanks to its building physics qualities (good thermal insulation and good heat storage), contributes to optimising the building’s energy balance. The full-height glass facades to the south are a response to the marvellous views across the plain of the River Wulka and, thanks to regulatory elements (sun screen system), can allow energy (solar heat gain) to enter the building or can screen most of it.

Raiffeisen Finanz Center 11

Variable indoor space as a regulated system of reference

The interior is formulated as a regulated system of reference on various levels of meaning:

Firstly, in terms of spaces and materials it forms a single entity with the building’s external form. The material used for the external shell provides the starting point for the concept of materials used in the interior. Like the facade, the window reveals and the fan coils are also clad with Alucobond. The suspended ceilings in the formal areas on the upper floor are made of the metal in the same colour so that, in a sense, the building envelope is drawn into the interior. The exposed, unclad areas of ceiling and external wall are made of smooth exposed concrete. Plasterboard painted light grey is used for the suspended ceilings above the corridor areas as well as for parts of the office partition walls, and together with flooring of sound absorbent rubber or carpet complements the canon of materials in softly graduated shades of grey. The elegant neutralizing background allows individual colour accents to be used in the work area to emphasise special areas, spheres, or significance.

Raiffeisen Finanz Center 19

Secondly, in directing the relationship between indoor and outdoor space. The office walls onto the corridor zones are, in principle, to be made as a system of glass partitions whose degree of transparency can be modified by the use of foils. This means that views inside, outside and through the building can be directed as required, transparency and spatial depth can be experienced, and indeed outdoor space and the landscape are brought into the innermost area of the building. The interior design is intended to allow spatial relationships, not to block them.

Raiffeisen Finanz Center 20

Thirdly, as a depiction of the company’s internal organisation
The structural layout of the building and the articulation of the facade on a basic grid of 1.30 m allows the office partition walls to be positioned flexibly within the given grid system. This allows rooms of different sizes to be made that respond to various functions and needs and, where necessary, can be easily altered. Open, semi-open or closed areas can be easily made in different formulations. The plans of the different floors illustrate this system’s high degree of flexibility. Monotony and repetition are avoided; different functions and levels of organization can be depicted.

Fourthly, as an articulated body of rules of communication
The partitions between the individual offices are made of glass or have a high-level strip of glazing that varies in height. The different amounts of glazing articulate the different amount or degree of communication required.

Raiffeisen Finanz Center 21

Particular attention is devoted to the design of the foyer and entrance hall. As a connecting element between the existing fabric and the new building this space is the building’s calling card, so to speak. Its quality is derived from its permeability, its height, the connecting bridges that traverse it, and from its glass facades that are several storeys high: the glass facade to the outside and the glass facade positioned in front of the restructured part of the existing fabric for which an artistically designed lighting concept is employed.

Raiffeisen Finanz Center 16
Raiffeisen Finanz Center 23
Raiffeisen Finanz Center 03
Raiffeisen Finanz Center Modell 01

Architecture

Pichler & Traupmann Architects

Project team

Sandy Panek

Barbara Aull

Peter Bayer

Gabriele Bruckmayer

Joao Camarinha da Silva

Christoph Degendorfer

Karin Drexler

Anke Freimund

Mario Gasser

Konrad Hofmann

Michael Ivancsics

Christoph Leitner

Jan Revaj

Jürgen Schneeberger

Wolfgang Windt

Competition team

Christoph Degendorfer

Wolfgang Windt

Client

Propria Raiffeisen-Immobilien-Leasing GmbH , Vienna

Project management

Raiffeisen Leasing Immobilienmanagementges.m.b.H, Vienna

Project- and planning coordination, bidding

FCP-Fritsch Chiari & Partner Ziviltechniker GmbH, Vienna

Project coordination

Markus Weiner Ziviltechniker Ges.m.b.H, Gattendorf

Structural design

FCP-Fritsch Chiari & Partner Ziviltechniker GmbH, Vienna

Structural design execution planning

Woschitz Engineering Ziviltechniker GmbH, Eisenstadt

Building physics

Walter Prause, Vienna

MEP engineering

ZFG-Projekt Planungs- und Beratungsgesellschaft m.b.H., Baden

Electrical engineering:

Kubik Project Ges.m.b.H., Gießhübl

Facade technology

FOB.PS face/of/buildings - planningstimakovits, Oberpullendorf

Soil reports

Wolfgang Hazivar ZT Bauwesen, Eisenstadt

Site supervision

Josef Lörincz, Großhöflein und AXIS Ingenieurleistungen ZT GmbH, Vienna

Hard facts

Start of planning: 2006

Start of construction: 2008

Completion: 2010

Usable floor area: 2561 m²

Location: Eisenstadt, AT

Function: Office building

Scope: Designer with responsibility for all design services

Photographs

Paul Ott, Graz

Lisa Rastl, Vienna

Award

Invited competition 1st prize