Canned Pipes

The design of the new home of the Human Resources Department of the Autonomous Province of Bolzano began with the complex spatial articulation of one-dimensional elements interacting with the volume generated by the extrusion of lot lines.

The backbone of the building consists of a series of longitudinal volumes – identified as “tubes” – traversing it from ground to sky and overlapping in a seemingly casual manner, with different alignments. This stack, only apparently unstable, comes into contact with the geometry of the external surface; this interaction exposes the fronts of the volumes, behind the external shell. Simple openings are flanked by long cuts with more articulated edges.

The key materials of the design are treated in opposing manners: white semi-transparent microperforated metal wrapping the tower-offices

is juxtaposed against a continuous façade of sliding panels that conceal the pattern of windows behind and contrast the unexpected emergence of the wooden “tubes”.