The seven-story glued timber block was built in 2015 as part of the Aspern Lakeside Residential District, which Wien 3420 Aspern Development AG is building in the northeast of Vienna. The site was previously occupied by an airfield, civilian and military, and in 1945-1955, also by a Soviet military town. The development of the territory began in 2004, according to the master plan of the Lisbon bureau ZT Arquitectos. A man-made lake was created here, the metro station Seestadt - "Lake City" was built. The dwelling is being built according to a radial-ring plan, the center of which is a lake. The houses are relatively low - about 7-10 floors with rare dominants up to 22, laconic but varied; the area is quiet and clean, claims to be a smart city. It is planned to proportionally combine housing and jobs, the area should become environmentally friendly; a Vienna educational campus for 2,000 children is under construction (see a good report on Aspern here).
The D12 quarter, designed by Querkraft and Berger + Parkkinen (the architects received the order after winning an open competition), is located on the outer, southeastern border of the new residential area, while not far from the lake and park, as well as from the Opel plant. It resembles the neighboring quarters with a plot area of 0.77 hectares, with a height of 4-7 floors, a landscaped courtyard closed from cars and multifunctionality - 8 shops are built into the first floors of the 213-apartment complex. However, unlike the nice but concrete neighbors, the quarter is built of glued timber, albeit on a concrete frame.
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zooming 1/3 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 2/3 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 3/3 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
External walls with natural wood cladding and stone wool insulation and internal walls with built-in communications were made at the factory and only assembled at the construction site, which made it possible to minimize noise and construction time, which is important, since the area is being built gradually and populated quarter by quarter. Loggias-bay windows with a strong overhang are also prefabricated, prefabricated.
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zooming 1/3 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 2/3 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 3/3 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
The quarter consists of three groups of gallery houses, stretched parallel to the long side of the rectangular section. The houses are grouped along the galleries in dotted lines, with breaks; along the inner street of the town, they adjoin the transverse bulkhead, where shops with glass facades are mainly grouped under consoles that are noticeably raised above the sidewalk.
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zooming 1/5 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 2/5 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 3/5 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 4/5 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 5/5 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
The entrance to the courtyard, open to the townspeople and interpreted as a public meeting place and children's games, is arranged not from the “shop” street, but to the left of it, in the southeastern part of the block. The authors interpreted it as a "canyon": in the southern part, two passages are widened funnel-shaped, in the middle they merge, and to the north they go out in a narrow "gorge". Such a transverse path, from the southeast to the northwest, ensures the connectivity of courtyard spaces between houses. The buildings are located in a two-level underground parking lot, which occupies the entire spot of the site, except for the triangle under the entrance "canyon". The plans for the complex can be found here.
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zooming 1/4 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 2/4 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 3/4 Residential area D12 in Aspern Lake City Photo © Herta Hurnaus
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zooming 4/4 Residential area D12 in "Lake Aspern City" Photo © Herta Hurnaus
In the courtyards there are active geoplastics, bushes, strips of grass, and a lot of wooden paving: the tree underfoot, on the one hand, echoes the texture of the facades, and on the other, creates the feeling of a semi-interior, “home” open-air space. Moreover, the wooden pavement constantly strives to climb the slope, on which, as the authors of the project emphasize, you can lean your elbows to rest, and run up and climb up, playing some catch-up.
The interiors are colorful and laconic, but the stairs, again, according to the authors, are flooded with light. The apartments are planned flexibly, firstly, they are of different formats, large and small, and secondly, the project has thought out the possibilities of unification: communications are assembled, as expected, in key shafts. In other words, the wooden quarter of Aspern is an exemplary part of an exemplary town, albeit with a concrete frame. Its wooden texture and active bay windows are also artistically the most prominent among the varied, but generally neutral, buildings in the progressive Viennese area designed by different architects.
