Bolles + Wilson GmbH & Co. KG

Housing at St. Sebastian Church

Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Roman Mensing

HOUSING AT ST. SEBASTIAN CHURCH

Bolles + Wilson

ARCHITECTS
Bolles + Wilson

MANUFACTURERS
Hagemeister, Heck Wall-Systems, Sonopor

ARCHITECT IN CHARGE
Julia B. Bolles-Wilson, Peter Wilson

SERVICE ENGINEERS
Ingenieurbüro Nordhorn GmbH & Co. KG

STRUCTURAL ENGINEERS / BUILDING PHYSICS
ahw Ingenieure GmbH, Münster

FIRE PROTECTION
W+W Sachverständige und Ingenieure für Brandschutz GmbH & Co. KG

CLIENT
Wohn+Stadtbau GmbH

PHOTOGRAPHS
Roman Mensing, Peter Wilson

AREA
7154 m²

YEAR
2016

LOCATION
Münster, Germany

CATEGORY
Housing

Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Roman Mensing

Text description provided by architect.

In 2009 BOLLES+WILSON won the 1st prize for housing and a kindergarten on the site of the 1960s St Sebastian Church. 

It was expected that the emblematic oval form of the church be demolished. Instead the kindergarten colonized the nave. It was opened in 2013 – a much published reuse with interior green weather protected play decks.

Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Roman Mensing
Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Peter Wilson

Now phase 2 is complete, a peripheral frame of housing protecting the kindergarten from a noisy street and giving a precise edge to the adjacent park.

Market realities are clearly visible in the differentiation of the social (subsidized) housing with its bright white and pink plaster facade to Hammer Str. and the owner-occupied flats with their noble dark brick facade facing the mature trees in the park.

Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Peter Wilson
Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Roman Mensing

One corner tree is explicitly embraced by the projecting white sheet of the street facade.

Only kitchen and bathroom windows are allowed to receive traffic noise; living rooms and balkonies turn inwards to the quiet green space surrounding the kindergarten.

Unexpected colour animates the lift and stair tower and the setback roof apartments. This polychrome trope also animates the skyline of the park elevation.

Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Peter Wilson
Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Peter Wilson

Here big white frames give a grand order, a vertical hierarchy. But ultimately it is the grandeur of the existing trees that claim the status of leading actors in the spatial choreography.

PRODUCT DESCRIPTION.

The bricks reflect the predominant façade material of the surrounding city while at the same time introduce a new colour and orientation (vertical).

Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Roman Mensing
Housing at St. Sebastian Church
© Roman Mensing

While the subsidized housing part is covered with white and coloured plaster it is the dark brick façade of the owner-occupied part that really gives the mature trees of the adjacent park a noble background.


Housing at St. Sebastian Church
Site Plan
Housing at St. Sebastian Church
Floor Plan


Housing at St. Sebastian Church
Sketch
Housing at St. Sebastian Church
Model


Housing at St. Sebastian Church
Elevation

Bolles + Wilson GmbH & Co. KG
T +49 25 1482720 F +49 25 14827224
Bolles + Wilson GmbH & Co. KG
Hafenweg 16, 48155 Münster, Germany