social culture — trade culture — semiotic culture
transdisciplinary architecture
architects, interior designers, brand architects, retail designers, retail consultants, product designers, sociologists, communication scientists, communication designers
Stuttgart — Berlin — Mannheim — Ahmedabad
For the world market leader in the field of machines for the woodworking industry, based in Schopfloch in the Black Forest, blocher partners planned a new campus at the company headquarters as part of a design competition: A head office with 16,500 square meters and 550 workplaces, an employee restaurant and a customer center will redesign the factory premises. Our design in timber construction convinced the jury and was awarded 1st prize.
Our process "#WeForUs — Sustainable Strategy Development" made it to 1st place in the category "Employee Engagement" at the HR Excellence Awards 2021. We are very happy and proud of this great recognition of our work! We would like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank noesis for the professional guidance on our journey.
At the beginning of 2020, we launched a strategy process together with noesis, our partner for change management, and have come a long way on our journey since then. With a participatory approach, we have manifested our corporate identity in values and guiding principles in employee surveys and evaluations, a total of three Future Camps and numerous Future Circles on forward-looking focus areas. Although the kick-off of the change project was in the middle of the first wave of the COVID pandemic, the participatory approach was consistently maintained using digital and hybrid formats.
We are delighted about the nomination of the recently opened extension of the Bründl flagship store in Kaprun for the EuroShop RetailDesign Award 2022! The award has been presented annually since 2008 and honors outstanding retail concepts worldwide. The winners will be announced on February 15 at the EuroCIS trade fair.
We are pleased about the appointment of our colleague Wiebke Ahues to the working committee for fees and contracts of the Architektenkammer Berlin (Berlin Chamber of Architects). Since the beginning of the year, she has been responsible as Director Berlin Office for the design and processes of the projects handled at the Berlin office as well as for the further development and profiling of the branch.
For the eighth time, the industry association IWS Immobilienwirtschaft honored properties and projects from the Stuttgart metropolitan region that stand out for their particular economic efficiency, sustainability and urban development quality. In the hotel category, the Design Hotel EmiLu received the award. For blocher partners partner Vandana Shah was on site at the event in the Alte Reithalle Stuttgart.
Photo: © IWS / Wolfgang List
We are pleased to welcome architect Helge Kunz as a new division manager in our office. Kunz looks back on a long career and expertise in timber construction: After working as a design architect and department head in competition, among others at Baumschlager Eberle and Santiago Calatrava, various activities abroad as well as his almost a decade-long activity at Renggli Holzbau Weise in a leading position, he held the position of managing director there for the last three years.
Kunz has already been entrusted with several teaching assignments in the past, including at the Technical University of Berlin. Currently, Kunz is researching and teaching timber construction at the Mainz University of Applied Sciences.
From now on, he will contribute his profound experience and expertise as head of our timber construction competence area. In order to permanently develop the topic as an integral part of our company and to implement it in all areas, Kunz will participate in all projects across all disciplines.
The climate-friendly and differentiated residential quarter on Hermann Dorner Allee is nearing completion. Now another milestone could be celebrated with the topping-out ceremony.
"It is the goal of sustainable and people-oriented urban planning to combine density and quality of life. Different building typologies, differentiated façade design and appealing open spaces that invite people to stay characterize our design. The heterogeneity of the buildings becomes a mirror of society. We expressly want the neighborhood to be mixed, and this is supported by social housing that is distributed across all the buildings and is in no way inferior in quality to all the other apartments," said Dieter Blocher at the event.
The neighborhood comprises 613 residential units, 253 of which are subsidized housing, for all generations and population groups. Overall completion is scheduled for November 2022. More information on the residential quarter.
Photo from left to right: Dieter Blocher, Karlheinz Heffner (Managing Partner D&S) and Ulrich Schiller (Managing Director HOWOGE).
Our workspace for Leonhard in Filderstadt was nominated for the Best Workspaces 2022 award and voted into the top 50. The award, created by the Callwey publishing house in cooperation with the architecture magazine Baumeister, baunetz interior|design, office roxx and office dealzz, honors outstanding workspaces and office buildings. We are delighted about the nomination by the jury and are looking forward to March 2022, when the winners of the competition will be announced.
At the Quartier annual congress organized by Heuer Dialog, which will take place in Bielefeld on September 16 and 17, Matthias Both will speak on Thursday afternoon about how revitalization and redensification can create sustainable urban neighborhoods and which projects by blocher partners are exemplary in this context.
Wir freuen uns auf die Eröffnung des EmiLu Designhotels am 1. September 2021. Bei einer Pressekonferenz an diesem Montag haben bereits einige Journalisten einen ersten Blick in das familiengeführte Hotel mitten im Herzen Stuttgarts werfen können. Neben den Bauherren und Betreibern des Hotels, der Familie Bräutigam, stellte sich auch unsere Partnerin und Hotelexpertin Anja Pangerl den Fragen der Journalisten.
Nach gewonnenem Fassadenwettbewerb war blocher partners nicht nur dafür verantwortlich, der Fassade mit behutsamen Eingriffen Charakterzüge zu verleihen, die die neue Funktion als Hotel sichtbar machen und dem Stadtraum hinter dem Marktplatz einen eleganten Auftritt zu verleihen. Auch das Interior Design trägt die Handschrift von blocher partners, das in enger Zusammenarbeit mit der Bauherrin Petra Bräutigam entwickelt wurde. „Das EmiLu besticht mit einer Emotionalität, die für ein Hotel sehr ungewöhnlich ist. In jeder Ecke kann man regelrecht spüren, mit welcher Leidenschaft und mit wie viel Liebe zum Detail hier geplant und gestaltet wurde“, betont Pangerl bei der Pressekonferenz.
Lädt das EmiLu Touristen und Geschäftsreisende ein in ein Zuhause fernab der Heimat, bietet es Stuttgartern einen neuen urbanen Lieblingsspot. Neben den 90 Zimmern und Suiten, der Lennarts Lounge mit Blick über die ganze Stadt und einem Fitness- und Wellnessbereich allein für die Hotelgäste, sollen das Frühstückslokal Fritz und die neue Bar der Tatti-Betreiber, das Gian Paolo e Marco, ganz bewusst auch Stuttgarter und Touristen ansprechen. Auch der Bauherr Michael Bräutigam zeigt sich bei der Pressekonferenz höchst zufrieden mit dem Ergebnis: „Ich bin wahnsinnig stolz. Ein solches Designhotel hat man in Stuttgart bislang vergeblich gesucht.“
An interview with Benjamin and Dieter Blocher on the subject of urban development appeared in the digital edition of the Stuttgarter Zeitung this weekend (StZPLUS). In the interview, the two architects talk about the Stuttgart of the future, the housing shortage including the forgotten solution of the candidates for mayor, the Stuttgart 21 rail project as an opportunity of the century – and the parent-son construct in the management. blocher partners is responsible for several major projects in the city and in Baden-Württemberg – in the interview they are presented in a picture gallery.
The Dipl.-Ing. and architect BDA Wiebke Ahues will head the Berlin office of blocher partners with immediate effect. As Director Berlin Office she is responsible for the design and processes of the projects handled there as well as for the further development and profiling of the office. She is particularly passionate about the issue of sustainability - associated with timber construction and timber hybrid construction as well as the reuse and revitalization of the heritage of late modernism.
After her studies at the University of Dortmund and the Technical University of Dresden, Ahues worked as a research assistant for Professor Jörg Springer and as a project manager for Max Dudler, among others. Most recently, she was an associate at David Chipperfield and played a major role in projects such as the conversion and expansion of the mixed-use complex Morland Mixité in Paris and the Nobelcenter in Stockholm.
The extension of the Bründl flagship store in Kaprun, which is currently under construction, was pre-certified by the Austrian Society for Sustainable Real Estate (ÖGNI) with platinum in the areas of interior design and restaurant based on the DGNB-criteria. For the assessment, sustainability is considered on the basis of ecological, economic, socio-cultural and functional factors. Technology, processes and location also play a role.
The interior designers have succeeded in creating a concept for the five-level sales area that combines a high aesthetic standard and great experiential and recreational qualities with sustainable planning that takes into account all aspects from the large to the small. Particularly noteworthy are the high indoor air quality, the responsible resource extraction, the low-pollutant and low-risk finish and the barrier-free accessibility. The concept was also rated very well by ÖGNI in terms of recyclability and energy efficiency as well as climate protection.
Certification is also being sought for the architecture of the striking building.
Further information on the expansion of the flagship store by blocher partners.
The Store Book published by the German Shopfitting Association (dLv) is a best-of of international shop design. In 2021, 50 projects worldwide are presented. Among them are six projects by blocher partners: in addition to Breuninger Nuremberg, which graces the cover, Braun Hamburg, Bucherer Düsseldorf, Bucherer Hamburg, Schuh Frank Bad Kreuznach and Steffl Vienna are also represented in the book.
An expansion in two senses: the architect and urban planner Benjamin Blocher will not only complement the management in the future, but also the expertise. With a focus on sustainability and innovation, he is particularly dedicated to the transformation of cities.
Benjamin Blocher will work at the interface between architecture and urban planning at blocher partners. Here he is particularly concerned with the transformation of cities, sustainable planning and thus the holistic life cycle approach to buildings and new building technologies. »These are topics that are close to my heart and that I am convinced will shape the way and where we live, work and spend our leisure time,« says Benjamin Blocher. Transdisciplinarity, design quality, joy in innovation and a clear commitment to the bond with our clients, he says, are values of the company that he wants to develop further in the future with his colleagues and the ten other partners in the management.
Benjamin Blocher, born in 1992, studied architecture at the ETH Zurich and worked for JAHN Chicago and COBE Berlin before joining KCAP Architects & Planners in Zurich as an architect and urban planner. He then joined the planning office founded more than 30 years ago by his parents, interior designer Jutta and architect Dieter Blocher.
blocher partners was successful in a competition to fill a gap in a building in Mannheim's city centre, taking into account listed buildings: the design for student housing was unanimously chosen as the winner.
The concept: A timber modular construction with 103 prefabricated room modules as a stock-conserving construction method reduces the inner-city burden by shortening the construction time on the one hand and delivers an appropriately high quality on the other. By using natural materials, a high feel-good factor and a good indoor climate are achieved.
The eco-efficient design saves grey energy and meets the highest sustainability requirements, with the cradle-to-cradle concept being an important point. Lively communication zones, such as a student café on the ground floor, form special modules in the five-storey development.
The sixth edition of Retail Design International has been published. The reference book presents over 40 concepts that are driving change in the retail sector.
blocher partners is represented with several projects: In addition to Breuninger in Nuremberg, Bucherer in Hamburg and Braun Hamburg can also be found in the book. Also part of Retail Design International is a guest article by Jutta Blocher on the planning and working concept of Design Strategy practised at blocher partners.
The 17th installment of Stuttgart meets Mumbai will take place digitally for the first time. From 22 to 28 February 2021, the audience will be offered an intercultural festival with a virtual exhibition, interactive webinars and culinary delights. The event, which includes the Stuttgart Wine Festival, has played an important role in promoting Indo-German relations over the past 17 years with visitors from politics, business and culture.
Due to our branch in Ahmedabad, India, we have maintained close ties with Indian culture for many years and have been represented with our own stand at the Stuttgart Wine Festival for several years. Find more information about the event here.
In the competition for the redevelopment of the former LEW site in Neu-Ulm's city centre at Heiner-Metzger-Platz, the design by blocher partners was unanimously chosen as the winner by the jury of experts. The architects' design envisages a six-storey building with around 13,500 square metres of usable space. In addition to the municipal library and a generational meeting place, there will be residential units, office space, gastronomy and an underground car park.
The clearly structured building translates the diverse uses into a stacked structure in which the individual building blocks are clearly recognisable, but at the same time enter into a multitude of synergies with each other. Wooden hybrid construction, a green transition between the base and staggered storeys, and communal areas for urban gardening are all part of the concept. The result is a striking building with a high recognition value in a central location that will have a lasting positive impact on the quarter in the heart of Neu-Ulm.
How could workplaces and office concepts of the future look like? What design choices characterise a modern working environment? The publication by Frame Publishers sheds light on these questions and offers a reference work on the contemporary design of workspaces. Also included is the project house developed by blocher partners for the AOK Baden-Württemberg.
From 23 January to 20 June, the exhibition «Einfach Grün - Greening the city» at Deutsches Architekturmuseum in Frankfurt/Main explores the question of how green buildings in cities can provide a better local climate. The exhibition also includes the Marvel Artiza building in Hubli, India, designed by blocher partners.
In 2020, many things have turned out differently than we had imagined, many things we could never have imagined or wanted to imagine. The world seems to be upside down, and with it the longing for orientation and participation, for transparent and comprehensible decisions, is growing. In terms of content and form, this yearbook, which for us is not always just a retrospective, but also a perspective, is marked by the changes that the year brought, the changes in perspective that occurred, the reflections that were stimulated.
Learn more about our yearbook.
The office and living space in Krefeld was certified with gold by the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB). The certification system evaluates the overall performance of a building in several categories like environmental quality, economic quality, sociocultural quality, technical quality, process quality and location quality. More facts about the building by blocher partners.
At the competition “new construction community centre (town hall with museum)” in the North Rhine-Westphalian city of Olpe, the design by blocher partners received recognition as well as the first prize for the ideas section, which was developed together with Gänssle + Hehr landscape architects. Designed in a wood-hybrid design, the new building takes up the conditions of the surroundings, creates a high point along the Bigge River and, together with the area from the idea part, a new city square for the city society.
Rottweil's municipal council ratified the result of the architectural competition on "Spitalhöhe Rottweil", which was won by blocher partners. The new construction of this living quarter will provide around 35 apartments constructed in innovative hybrid design.
The business center Mondeal Heights in Ahmedabad – planned by blocher partners – was sucessful at the Rethinking The Future Awards 2020 in the category"Commercial (Built)". Further information on the project Mondeal Heights.
blocher partners has won the first prize in the architecture competition " Quartier am Wiener Platz Baufeld Süd Los 1". For the future area on Wiener Platz, the architects are developing the largest of the three emerging houses with 62 apartments and an underground car park for the entire area. The apartments with a size of one to five rooms are efficiently planned over five upper floors, on the ground floor, an including catering, a day care as well as a commercial space, round off the diverse range of the district.
blocher partners has won the first prize in the competition "Modernes Wohnen in gewachsenem Wohngebiet in Stuttgart-Degerloch". Surrounded by partly old, rural building fabric, 22 residential units with individual apartments are created in "Alt-Degerloch", which combine what distinguishes Degerloch: the rural meets the urban. The building structure is flexible in order to be able to react to changes in demand. The focus is on compact living units, which offer the possibility of arranging many rooms and at the same time achieving high quality if they are used openly.
The Mondeal Heights project in Ahmedabad, India, realized by blocher partners, was named "Commercial Project of 2019" at the Trends Excellence Awards in Mumbai. More information on Mondeal Heights Ahmedabad
blocher partners' fair booth at EuroShop 2020 has been awarded with the 1st prize at Exhibitor Magazine's EuroShop Awards in the category XS and succeded against nine competitors in the final round.
The BOSS-Outlet in Metzingen has been awarded the DGNB-platinum certification – the highest certification by the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB).
The certification system evaluates the overall performance of a building in several categories like environmental quality, economic quality, sociocultural quality, technical quality, process quality and location quality. More facts about BOSS-Outlet.
"Favo – the light net" scored at German Design Award 2020. The innovative luminaire was developed by the product designers at blocher partners together with Sattler GmbH. Partner Angela Kreutz and product designer Alexander Rybol attended the award ceremony for blocher partners.
The PICK luminaire, a track-based spotlight which was developed for RD Leuchten, scored at iF Design Award 2020 in the category product.
The new Rieger Group flagship store in Heilbronn scores with a combination of CO2-neutral architecture, top design quality, gastronomy and a wide range of products that makes for a holistic shopping experience. The jury at the "Stores of the Year" awarded the first prize to the furniture store in the Home/Living category.
Foto: f.l.t.r: Andrea Kurtz (Presentation), Stefan Dechering (Hermann Dechering), Benno Rieger (Möbel Rieger), Anja Pangerl, Angela Kreutz, Matthias Both, Stefan Genth (CEO HDE)
Photography: Jörn Wolter
On January 27 in 2020 we celebrated the groundbreaking ceremony for the HOWOGE housing association's largest new building project, which blocher partners together with the Diringer & Scheidel Bauunternehmung GmbH & Co. KG implemented as general contractor.
Eleven houses, a 500 square meter day-care center and 1,000 square meters of commercial space are to be built here by autumn 2022. Of the total of 613 apartments, 108 are planned as 25 square meters unfurnished micro-apartments for students. Half of the 505 rental apartments are rented as subsidized housing in accordance with the cooperation agreement of the State of Berlin.
"With our design, we wanted to develop a holistic neighborhood that appeals to different strata of the population and guarantees a lively, social and age-specific mix of residents," said Dieter Blocher. In addition to affordable rents and high-quality urban development, the district on Herman-Dorner-Allee stands for the latest energy technology: A climate-friendly overall concept with photovoltaics, CO2-free tenant electricity and energy-saving system technology ensures a good ecological balance.
In addition to CEO Dieter Blocher and team, district mayor Oliver Igel, Thomas Felgenhauer and Ulrich Schiller, managing director of HOWOGE, as well as Heinz Scheidel, chairman of the management board of Diringer & Scheidel were on site.
The product designers at blocher partners have recieved quite a few awards for product developments like the PICK luminaire and many more. At blocherpartners_productdesign on Instagram one can find news about their exciting projects.
The blocher partners yearbook is already a kind of celebrity and popular among customers as well as lovers of architecture, interior design and design. The recently published edition looks back on 30 years of blocher partners and at the same time offers a cross section of current projects. You can read it in digital form as an e-paper.
We wish you a pleasant reading!
Light forms an elementary part of any staged setting. The PICK luminaire combines innovation and variability with a high-end design. The efficient interaction of the components translates into compact dimensions and a broad variety of uses, be it in retail, work or hotel environments.
The jury of the renowned Good Design Awards was convinced by the flexible luminaire. PICK was developed by the product designers at blocher partners together with RD Leuchten.
EuroShop is the leading fair in the retail branch and takes place in Düsseldorf from February 16th until February 20th. blocher partners is amongst the exhibitors. You can meet us at hall 12 / A17-18
Ist Genuss die neue DNA? Was sind die Trends der Gastronomie und wie beeinflussen sie Gestaltung und Branding im Handel? Über 180 Teilnehmer diskutierten auf der EHI Retail Design Konferenz am 17. und 18. September in Köln darüber, wie sich der stationäre Einzelhandel mit starken Konzepten und einer guten Story behaupten kann. Für blocher partners waren Angela Kreutz und Jürgen Gaiser dabei und sprachen über Do‘s and Don‘ts, Herausforderungen und Chancen in der Branche.
Two projects by blocher partners were among the five winners of the BDA Prize Lower Saxony, which is presented every four years. The jury was won over by both the renovation of Lower Saxony State Parliament and the construction of Bissendorf’s new town hall. Senior Partner Wolfgang Mairinger and his clients accepted the awards in a ceremony at the Sprengel Museum Hannover.
More pictures from the ceremony can be found her at BDA-Blog.
30 years of blocher partners: Colleagues and their families celebrated this anniversary with a summer party at the Stuttgart office
Das von blocher partners geplante Wohnturmensemble Skydeck Select in Ahmedabad erhielt beim Realty+ Excellence Award in Indien eine Auszeichnung für Architectural Design of the year. Auf der Preisverleihung nahm Hartmut Wurster, Head of blocher partners india, den Preis entgegen.
How do the changes in the retail sector affect our cities? To discuss this question, a dialogue among experts took place at the Immobiliendialog Rhein-Neckar. For blocher partners, Senior Partner Wolfgang Mairinger took part in the discussion.
Matthias Both, Partner bei blocher partners, wurde in den Beirat der Akademie der Immobilienwirtschaft in Stuttgart berufen. Die Akademie verleiht in Kooperation mit der Dualen Hochschule Baden-Württemberg den Abschluss Diplom-Immobilienökonom/in (ADI).
The German Design Council awarded the German Design Award 2019 for three projects of blocher partners: The Lower Saxony State Parliament in Hanover, Fashion House Juhasz in Bad Reichenhall and the Stockman Department Store in Tapiola, Finland.
Our yearbook is popular among clients and fans of architecture, interior design and design. (link: The recently published 2018/19 issue is now also available as free e-paper.
We hope you enjoy reading our new yearbook!
We are glad to announce that the fashion store Henschel in Heidelberg was awarded the prize "store of the day" from the specialist magazine Textilwirtschaft.
Die Jury von bdia ausgesucht! 2018 hat entschieden: Das von den Produktdesignern bei blocher partners gemeinsam mit Vitra entwickelte hochflexible Deckenschienensystem Multi-Lane erreichte den 1. Platz.
