German-Japanese Center

The German-Japanese Centre consists of two buildings, one of them a slim bar of a house which curves along the Fleet (narrow canal), as if bowing to the urban situation. Slimness and bowing are both metaphors for Japanese culture. The second house, however, appears like a sharp-edged block firmly attached to the ground, representing virtues one might ascribe to the Germans. At the same time, this building, at the rear, opens out into stepped semi-open courtyards. A pedestrian arcaded passage along the Stadthausbrücke forms a stretch of weather-protected urban street space. The façades also show a marked duality: the street fronts are clad with dark clinker bricks, in deliberate contrast to the filigree transparent glazing to the rear. The functional interior organization was developed as a synthesis of German and Japanese elements, i.e. the typical office cubicle and the openplan office landscape.