BATHHOUSE BADSTUEGADE
// Project Duration: September - December, 2023
// Project Location: Badstuegade, Aarhus
// Aarhus School of Architecture: (Tutor) Jonathan Foote
Located in the heart of the vibrant area Midbyen, the site is anchored by a cycling and a vehicle street - Klostergade and Badstuegade. With heavy amenities around the area and traffic, the site gives the opportunity to provide a public program. With the small and irregular site footprint, the program needs to be placed strategically, therefore a basement plan is proposed to fit all the programs from the brief, as well as maintaining a similar building height with the surrounding urban fabric.
in respect to the climate analysis. The annual radiation exposure analysis shows the optimal passive strategies for the massing design. Southern sun allows the right angle to heat up the building and courtyard, whereas the northern side does not have access to solar heat gain during the winter. With all this under consideration the massing can adapt to achieve optimal thermal performance throughout the year.
The complexity of the various architectural elements is supported by a relatively simple structural system. A column grid supports the public terrace, and in alignment with the beams on the basement level, it also holds up the changing rooms and the water feature, which includes a thin layer of water and a triple-glazed glass skylight. The aim is to allow natural light to penetrate into the basement level, creating a dynamic experience enhanced by the ripple effect of the water.
The glass blocks are self-supporting due to their double-glazed properties, which provide suitable thermal comfort within the interior while also allowing natural light to enter the spaces. The proposal involves using standard prefabricated glass blocks, each measuring 300mm x 300mm x 100mm.
The facade consists of modular and prefabricated glass blocks. The translucent properties of the glass blocks provide natural light into the interior spaces as well as privacy for some programs. The northern facade has a building height of roughly 10 metres. As a way to express the architectural mechanical systems, all mechanical systems and ducts are placed on that facade, exposing the systems of the building to convey an expression of a modern object in a historical urban fabric area. The glass blocks apply a translucent effect, to blur out the harsh outlook of the mechanical systems like heat pumps and machines.
The changing room strategy is to create a flow that is intuitive and easy to access all programs in order. Arrival with the order of shoe cabinet, lockers, changing room stalls, toilets, wash basins, and showers. After bath house experience you come back up to the changing room with showers access before entering back to your lockers and changing room stalls. This configuration also allows minimising wet floor, separating the dry and wet zones with clear barriers and circulations.
After going through the changing room experience, it directly lands downwards to the bathing experience. The concept of the bathhouse experience is to flood that entire basement with water. Almost like an archipelago, having decks and little islands for people to sit and submerge into the water. There are also sauna room and aroma spaces for people to pause and transit to different temperatures of water.
The changing room have close proximity towards the arrival lobby, where after it goes through the changing room configuration - to create a flow that is intuitive and easy to access all programs in order. Arrival with the order of shoe cabinet, lockers, changing room stalls, toilets, wash basins, and showers. After bath house experience you come back up to the changing room with showers access before entering back to your lockers and changing room stalls. This configuration also allows minimising wet floor, separating the dry and wet zones with clear barriers and circulations.
