Interview with visiting professor Armin Behles, TU Darmstadt, Germany

Building with brick means thinking in brick

Photo/Foto: WBM/Claudius Pflug

» Dipl.-Ing. Armin Behles together with Jasper Jochimsen, runs the architects’ office Behles & Jochimsen Gesellschaft von Architekten mbH in Berlin

Photo/Foto: WBM/Claudius Pflug

>>1 Organizers and supporters of the exhibition and project (from left to right): Georg Kolbe (Weber St. Gobain), Prof. Armin Behles (TU Darmstadt), Oliver Rühr (Wienerberger), Margitta Zielecke (Wienerberger), Christina Geib (WBM), Regula Lüscher (Construction Director at the Berlin Senate) and Tomislav Kovacevic (Wienerberger)

Photo/Foto: WBM/Claudius Pflug

Photo/Foto: Marcus Bredt

»2 On eye-level: all eleven exhibits are presented on stela made of filled Poroton clay blocks

Photo/Foto: Marcus Bredt

Photo/Foto: TU Darmstadt/Lucas Bickert and Martin Koleda

»3 The WBM presented the award for experimental spatial design. The first prize for the design “Karl und Koppen – Wohnen an der Karl-Marx-Allee” (Karl and Koppen – Living on Karl-Marx Allee) went to Lucas Bickert and Martin Koleda

Photo/Foto: TU Darmstadt/Lucas Bickert and Martin Koleda

Photo/Foto: TU Darmstadt/Charlotte Knorr

»4 Placed second was Charlotte Knorr with her design “Apartment-Wohnen” (Apartment Living). She created an architectural link between prefab buildings and “Workers‘ Palaces” from the1950s in the Karl-Marx-Allee

Photo/Foto: TU Darmstadt/Charlotte Knorr

Photo/Foto: TU Darmstadt/Marian Brzezina

» Third prize went to Marian Brzezina for his “Studenten-Tower an der Mollstrasse“ (Student Tower on Mollstrasse). The jury praised the disciplined yet dynamic design

Photo/Foto: TU Darmstadt/Marian Brzezina

“Sustainable building is simple building!” Under the direction of visiting professor Armin Behles, architecture students at TU Darmstadt proved this theory with their designs. The students have come up with high-rise buildings with contemporary forms of housing in Berlin-Friedrichshain. Armin Behles explained to us the idea behind the design of the apartment high-rise buildings, the exhibition “Low Tech High Rise”, design and construction with perlite-filled clay blocks and cooperation with Wienerberger.

Professor Behles, how did you come up with the design idea for these high-rise homes?

The Berlin-based architecture researcher Tobias Engelschall told me about the WBM housing association’s plan to re-consolidate its housing stock in Friedrichshain-West with punctual high-rises. Almost at the same time, I read about perlite-filled Poroton clay blocks, which can be used to build nine-storey buildings. High-rises are just being rediscovered, and even from a very familiar material like clay, we can gain new qualities.

What shape has your cooperation with Wienerberger taken?

We spoke to Tomislav...