SCG - Social Center for Assisted Living

Graz, Austria

Photo © Gerner Gerner Plus. | Matthias Raiger

Retirement Homes

Architects: GERNER GERNER PLUS

Location: 8020 Graz, Austria
Year: 2015

On the spacious parc grounds of Congregation of the Mission a centrally-located nursing home and a house for assisted living with a parish building are under construction. Through the placement of the building volumes, the ensemble borders the garden at the center of the parc. Targeted zoning should allow space for a variety of needs and functions. The synergy effect between the church community and the new old-age homes should also be deliberately fostered here.

A longitudinally elongated building volume, which orients along the rise of the terrain on the edge of the property and, in part, shifts below ground, houses the assisted living. The cube is visually held to the ground with an emphatically horizontal arrangement through bands of loggia, which also gives it an elongated and light character. As a counterpoint, color-contrasted, differently dimensioned storage boxes are set in the loggias, making legible the individual living units. The loggias provide every room with its own outdoor space, and guarantee optimal natural lighting in all of the living and gathering spaces.