Music School FILUM

Filderstadt, Germany

Photo © Mário P. Rodrigues

Schools

Architects: ORANGE BLU

Location: Filderstadt, Germany
Year: 2016

The whole house is ringing with music since the Music School Filderstadt-Bernhausen moved into the new building in December 2016. Five storeys with 4000 square meters are now being played on. These include a concert hall of high acoustic quality with 280 seats, 22 acoustically optimised practice rooms, and a diversity of rooms for chamber groups and all kinds of ensembles and bands. The communicative centre of the school is the glazed atrium. The five-storey space with its offset flights of stairs, finely graduated blue walls, and staggered upwards opening an extraordinary spatial experience.

Architecturally, the building is inspired by music and musical instruments. Form, colour and material borrow themes from the piano and its keys. The highly reflective black tile surfaces on the white cubic exterior remind of the rhythm of pressed black keys. The white keys appear in the ivory coloured rendered surfaces. The timber panelling in the concert hall interior continues these motifs.

The new music school is situated directly adjacent to the Fleinsbach Secondary School, the Circular Sports Hall, and the FILharmonie concert venue. The client, the Karl Schlecht Foundation, bestowed this school in the cultural centre of his home town with the idea of conveying values to children and youths by supporting their musical Talent.