schneider+schumacher

Hager’s new administrative building and training facility is built around the company’s main entrance and forms part of the existing building ensemble. The two ends of the building house core facilities including subsidiary rooms and WCs and allow access to other areas of the complex. The free-spanning space in-between is devoted to the training area; three rooms connected to an open-plan office. All these spaces are accessed via a foyer running the entire length of the south elevation. Open-plan offices interspersed with small or large meeting rooms are situated on the two upper floors.

The building’s overall design and that of its exterior is based on a binary ‘on-off’ principle, specially developed to reflect the essential nature of Hager as a company concerned with electrical installations – energy either flows or it does not. This idea is expressed on the north and south elevations in alternating open (non-load-bearing) and closed (load-bearing) elements. The closed elements consist of precast concrete panels hung with curtain glazing on the outside face. These are alternated with a continuous vertical band of window glazing. The ends walls of the building are clad in aluminium, including the emergency exit doors. The building is naturally ventilated with tilt-opening windows. Each floor has only one remotely controlled window connected to a sensor measuring both CO2 concentration and outside temperature and this window opens automatically at night to allow fresh air to enter the building, ensuring a pleasant indoor climate in the morning. For user-comfort one window per element can be manually opened to its full width between the closed panels. Solar protection on the exterior is achieved through regularly milled and cut aluminium panels (E6EV1) taking up the whole storey height. These allow views to the outside even in their closed position and when not in use they are stored between the curtain glazing and the black-covered insulation panels. A solar sensor regulates the movement of the aluminium panels to their position in front of the windows. Curtain glazing panels are point-connected to an aluminium sub-frame using undercut anchors. The inner side of the curtain glazing (10 mm ESG white glass) is printed with a white pattern corresponding to the pattern on the aluminium solar protection panels, setting up intriguing and shifting visual effects, depending on the viewing distance and angle of vision. Internally, manually operated anti-glare panels are situated between the wall elements.

The ceiling and roof construction consists of pre-stressed elements, subsequently covered with a layer of concrete on site. These span the entire width of the building and are supported by, and connected to the preformed load-bearing wall elements on the building’s facade. Panel ribs incorporate remote-activated heating and cooling elements for the building and the surfaces of the pre-formed concrete wall and overhead elements are varnished. Acoustic lining is mounted between the ribs, to allow maximum area on the surface of the concrete ribs for climatic activation. Training rooms, meeting areas and WCs are served by a ventilation unit, which also allows the area to be used as a combined office.

A geo-thermal energy facility for cooling and heating has been incorporated under the slab of the new building and the activated elements integrated in the building’s ribbed ceiling construction are connected to a thermal pump. Exhaust heat extracted from the production area located opposite serves as an additional heat-source as and when required.