Home for Dockers Workplaces / Architectural Workshop Circull
House for Dockers Offices / Architectural Workshop Circull
Text description provided by the architects. A building for the port workers along with the administrative offices for technical services (“The Dockers’ House”) is located at the place for container storage. This led to the idea of utilising a so-called “backstage design” technique in order to conceal the building amid one of the main functional features of the port. Hence, the trawl ship, on which sea containers are loaded, has become an artistic image of the facility.
However, this is really a trick: a building is not a pre-made container structure. On the contrary, a metal frame was developed, being designed for the seismic zone of the region, where earthquakes may reach up to 9 points; therefore, the project has passed the appropriate technical expertise. The very “pie” of the facade presents a multilayer sandwich: the front side is lined with shaped elements that precisely replicate the doors and the end panels of the cargo containers, whereas the “ship skeleton” is sheathed with burnt wood.
The building is located at the foot of a hill with a height difference of up to 10 meters, so that the retaining wall system has become both an engineering structure and an element of the site improvement. The terraces surrounding the building were left in concrete without cladding, yet, to support the architectural and artistic concept of the “ship deck”, the upper part of the terrace formwork was made of unedged planks to create wood texture.
The project is complex, therefore, not only the architectural image of the building was developed, but also interior designs, as well as graphic navigation and corporate identity. Numerous “ship” motives and techniques are also present: round portholes, “deck” finishing, metal nets and slats, and lamps, placed in the manner of arrows of marine instruments.
The only bright accents in the monochrome solution (in addition to the orange overalls of the dockers) are the active accents of yellow in the bathrooms. Furthermore, the colour scheme includes the corporate colours of the company logo – blue is used on the facade of the building and interior decoration, whereas red, the second corporate shade, is used for furniture. This combination is a reflection of all the magic of nature in Kamchatka: blue volcanoes at dusk on the other side of Avacha Bay and red clouds in the rays of the setting sun.
