Salewa Headquarters

A connection between nature, sociality and sustainability.

The Headquarters of Salewa, one of the most important manufacturing firms in Bolzano, is built between the city’s outskirts and the surrounding mountains. As well as housing new work spaces, the building aims to provide a space of interaction and communication between the company and its network of suppliers, partners and clients. The complex houses also the firm’s showroom, the auditorium, the fitness center for the employees and the nursery. These caracteristics brought the agency “ClimaHouse” to award the project with the “Work&Life” certification, an achievement which acknowledges not only
energy related aspects but also the social inclusion in the territory and the quality of life within the working environment.
The complex consists of a series of multifaceted slabs and towers, including a 50 metre-high structure, the tallest in the city. The project combines an electro-coloured micro-perforated aluminium skin which protects the most exposed parts of the building with a large vertical glass covering. The interplay between the thin sheet metal-like pillars and the delicate protective layers frames the façades and underline the contrast between the invisible and visible areas.
On one side the envelope design determines a projection of the internal view towards north over the mountains and the city, on the other, it allows to protect the internal environmental comfort from the summer solar radiation, providing shading and ventilantion for a maximum natural control.
lberto Sinigaglia
On the east side of the complex opens the impressive climbing wall’s proscenium, with 200 climbing routes between easy, intermediate and for experts. The wall overlooks the public green area and on the bistrot and represents the most convivial part of the complex.
The roof houses a photovoltaic system that makes the Headquarters energetically autonomous.