The Sound of Silence   — 

collective habitation for people
with visual impairment

Karlsruhe, Germany

The architectural structure provides orientation in the way of a spacial-body-performance. Thus it enables acoustic and haptic experience,
instead of visual perception.

The task was to design a home for individuals with visual impairmen. It should be located next to the tracks of the railwaystation of Karlsruhe. Visually impaired people have very skilled sensory, acoustic and olfactory senses. A set of spacial vocabulary was developed in order to enable non-visual orientation. Thus the focus was to create a building providing security and self-esteem for its inhabitants. Spacial attributes like echoes, widths of rooms, illumination, surfaces and others form the basis for the spacial vocabulary. It organises the whole building, in particular of how to orientate and move. The attributes were extracted from example architecture during initial excersises. They could be depicted as single atmospheres or even a complete spacial structure.

The spacial vocabulary forms individual spacial situations that are composed to become a sequence like a corridor with a hall, narrow and wide rooms, bright and dark spaces. The arrangement consists of repetitions and alterations, creating a pattern that helps orientating. The entire building is made by a certain scheme: the flats and other private rooms are arranged around public spaces.

sectional model


   

longitudinal section showing public elements winding through the structure