Gymnase Neudorf

Strasbourg, France

Photo © Sergio Grazia

Architects: Atelier Zündel Cristea

Location: Strasbourg, France
Year: 2014

The templates imposed by sporting practices allow little room for complex manipulations of volume. Thus our pragmatic approach to the program, which we sought to keep as compact as possible. The imposing scale of the project being given, our work involves a highlighting enhancement of the building's large facades and imposing height.

In our project, the architectural intention is intimately tied to the choices in construction.

These choices are guided by the nature of the project, the size of the program to be implemented, and the determination to employ wood, a renewable resource with no lack of ecological advantages. Today, apart from its large aesthetic and emotional value, the implementation of wood stems from our concern with ethical, energy, and environmental issues.

Specifically, our project consists of a concrete base (singular of course) that supports the ground from which the gymnasium, the bleachers, the locker-rooms, the sports hall and the cafeteria all rise, over which will be placed a “wooden box” containing a fencing hall with accompanying locker-rooms. These two major components of the program, corresponding to two different but equally traditional systems of construction, are both completely and clearly expressed as much as in the edifice's exterior volume as in its interior volume.