Reutlingen District Office

Situated on a derelict site at the north-eastern entrance to the city, the new administrative office for the local district of Reutlingen is conceived as an impactful urban building that marks its prominent urban location and regenerates a long-neglected part of the city.

Two interlocking building volumes, with one carved-out courtyard each, reinforce the street edges and are deliberately staggered in height in order to break up the scale of a large mass and to better integrate into the existing urban context. The building’s distinctive stepped apex, oriented to the main street crossing, gives identity to the new district office and constitutes a prelude, presenting a face to the urban figure when approaching the city centre. The volumetric concept and a finely detailed brick facade enveloping the entire volume create a building with public character and civic presence. The vertical articulation of the exposed brickwork constitutes an order that encircles the building with a playful relief of light and shadow.

The motif of an arcade along Karlstraße combined with a passage that leads beneath the building into an enclosed entrance courtyard consolidates and expands the public realm in an area impacted by two busy roads. Shielded from traffic noise, the arcade and entrance court convey a strong sense of address and intentionally extend the urban territory of the new administrative district office beyond the actual point of entrance to the building inside the forecourt. As an address for everyone – visitors and employees alike – the public courtyard thus becomes a place for the city, one that inside the public foyer and the assembly hall continues in the form of bright, generous spaces of civic scale.

Client: Georg Reisch GmbH & Co. KG
Status: In planning, completion 2026
Location: Stuttgarter Straße 30, Reutlingen
Gross floor area: approx. 42 500 m²
Rendering: SLAB, London