Won: PANDION Officehome SWING at Cologne Central Station

November 3rd, 2023
A commercial property with 11,000 square metres of gross floor space is being built at Breslauer Platz in Cologne

The jury decided on 2 November 2023: ASTOC ARCHITECTS AND PLANNERS' entry was convincing across the board and thus won against strong, well-known competition. We are delighted with this further success - our sixth first prize this year!

PANDION, a nationwide property developer based in Cologne, is developing a commercial property with 11,000 square metres of gross floor area in the immediate vicinity of Cologne's main railway station and with a direct view of the cathedral under the OFFICEHOME umbrella brand.

Our contribution is guided by the idea of not only creating the desired address within a heterogeneous environment, but also responding to the existing urban structures of the neighbouring buildings. The urban integration is achieved by continuing the neighbouring building heights, densifying the cubature towards the west with a staggering of up to seven storeys and moving the lower four storeys towards Breslauer Platz in order to strengthen the interlocking with the public space.

View of Domstraße

The prestigious entrance on Breslauer Platz provides access to all office floors via a light-flooded foyer, as well as small-scale retail, service outlets and restaurants on the ground floor. A second foyer on Domstrasse provides further vertical access to office space on the upper floors. The office working environments follow the New Work approach with a spatial offer for concentration, interaction and relaxation in order to support a dialogue and team-oriented way of working with a fundamentally variable space layout. A green inner courtyard visually connects the work areas and provides them with natural light. Four large roof gardens and a roof loggia with a spectacular view of the cathedral extend the working environment to the outside.

Our planning pursues a special sustainability of the building, taking into account the laws of a circular economy, as a zero-energy building with significant undercutting of the legal requirements for heat and electricity consumption and through an energy supply based on renewable sources with geothermal heat pumps and photovoltaics.