Das Züblin-Haus

One has lost the reference to the environmental context by increasing the isolation of the building through symmetries and repetitions. This creates a strange contrast in the Züblin House between heavy lateral bodies and a central bright and open gallery that is supposed to balance the inertia of the whole. In the centre, an enormous, transparent space opens up, enlivened by staircases and airy passages, which accommodates the vestibule and the side entrances, separating the paths and feeding them to the towers for the vertical connections. This hall concept undoubtedly requires skill. But the neoclassical forms and ornaments, which are absorbed and banalised rather than fused together, contradict the concept. Se ha perdido la referencia al contexto ambiental al aumentar el aislamiento del edificio mediante simetrías y repeticiones. Esto crea un extraño contraste en la Casa Züblin entre los pesados cuerpos laterales y una galería central luminosa y abierta que se supone que equilibra la inercia del conjunto. En el centro se abre un enorme espacio transparente, animado por escaleras y pasillos aireados, que acoge el vestíbulo y las entradas laterales, separando los recorridos y alimentando a las torres para las conexiones verticales. Este concepto de vestíbulo requiere, sin duda, habilidad. Pero las formas y los ornamentos neoclásicos, que se absorben y banalizan en lugar de fundirse, contradicen el concepto. On the one hand, the dynamic layout of an open cathedral, on the other, the nineteenth-century “passage” stripped of its urban function. A false historicist vein also permeates the many details, in the floors, in the constructive transitions, in the knotting of heavy concrete elements and light elements of coloured steel. Böhm thus gives us further proof of the impossibility of achieving a satisfactory compromise between exploring the new and returning to a revival.