- Metaxourgeio, Athens
- 2021
- Completed
- Private
ARCHITECTURAL STUDY OF A LISTED BUILDING WITH A FLOOR ADDITION
The purpose of the project was to architecturally study a listed building in the area of Metaxourgeio, with the request to add a floor in order to create a building of modern apartments.
The aim of our proposal regarding the additions is not the creation of new volumes with a mimetic approach to the existing building, but to create two new constructions clearly distinct from the existing one. Considering that the addition as a concept is an intervention in the historical continuity of the building and affects the authenticity of its preserved elements, we suggest that the volume of the addition to be clearly distinct from the existing building. This distinction concerns both its morphology and the chosen materials.
The addition of the second floor is placed in retreat to the facade of the building, and it develops along the axis of the balcony of the 1st floor, the main element of the existing facade.
A key part of the design of the new facade of the building is the penetration of the addition to the roof which retains its original form.
In the main elevation, the added volume grows parasitically, like a separate body, on the existing roof, giving it new vertices and points, thus redefining its shape. The roof is now the transitional part of the facade, from the compact volume of the existing stone building, to the light volume of metal and glass of the addition.