Hafenstraße, Münster

Tear down or legions of tradesmen? For the old building dating back to the 1950s, the decision was made to renovate, complete with contemporary facade insulation A budget of 3 million euro was available for the building measures to be carried out on the future home of the social welfare office. The building did not stand out particularly from the surroundings and continued the brick look typical for Münster. With its pillar-member balustrade construction, it reflected the modernity and practicality of its time. The building has different owners. This meant that it could only be partially renovated. The significantly smaller section – 5 window axes long and set apart clearly with a double wall – remained unrenovated. The initial state is therefore still clearly visible to this day. The protruding brick balustrades were in need of renovation. The pillars required repairs on the concrete. The architecture and plasticity of the building were retained during the renovation. The existing projections and recesses contribute significantly to the interesting plastic effect of the new facade image. The goal was to use color to breathe a sense of modernity into the facade of the building. It was to awaken curiosity and communicate a zest for life without being too bright. As colorful and changeable as life itself, never static. The brick red color typical of Münster was taken and transformed into a more saturated, bolder red. The red was mixed into a sunny ocher in two stages and distributed over the parapet surfaces. At first glance, the horizontal and vertical arrangement appears random. Only later does a certain regularity become apparent to the observer. The four colors change in a subtle sequence, yet strong color contrasts are clearly discernible thanks to the different vertical arrangement. Every shade is independently discernible and appears to change its color depending on the immediate surrounding color shade. The eye is taken on a voyage of discovery. Summary: The “colorful building” is unmistakable thanks to its modern color interaction and appealing architecture and almost “incidentally” became the first public building in the city of Münster to receive an energy pass through the reduction of the energy consumption to 39 kW/h.