Towards the street, all of the buildings make a generous gesture of welcome through colonnades, which create a sheltered transition from the public to the private realm. Shifts of volume within the building masses generate large shared terraces facing the water — one at podium level, one on the topmost floor — each framing views along the course of the Weser.

The buildings are conceived as timber–concrete hybrid structures. The podium, the access core and the floor slabs are planned in concrete, while the surrounding structure is built in sustainable timber with a post-and-beam façade. Partly translucent solar panels serve simultaneously as fall protection and as a façade element, generating energy from solar radiation while reflecting the glitter of the river. The layering of the façade, together with single-glazed acoustic windows, provides adequate sound insulation in an uncomplicated way. The repetition of identical structures and elements, and a reduction to the essentials, make the buildings economical to build. Taken together — the materials used, the energy generated through the façade, and the flexibility of the floor plans — the buildings are sustainable in a number of different respects.

Block 01

The clear, simple structure of both building types allows for maximum flexibility and variety in the floor plans; modularity makes a wide range of apartment sizes and layouts possible. Slight shifts of the rooms in relation to one another create diagonal sightlines in one typology, and loggias in the other. What all the floor plans share is a particular spatial generosity despite a low use of floor area, and every layout can be read and built either very openly or in a more classically enclosed way.

Block 2

Contact between residents arises through the shared use of outdoor spaces with views, and quite incidentally through chance encounters in the circulation areas, which feel especially communicative, interesting and generous thanks to their vertical relationships. The ground-floor uses are given floor plans of great simplicity, flexible and robust enough to respond to possible future changes of use, with large windows affording views of the water and the surrounding greenery.