Hotel in Gliwice — conversion of the PSS Społem building
Description
The PSS Społem hotel conversion in Gliwice, a concept awarded first prize in a 2017 architectural competition, turns part of the building into a three-star hotel through a technical and aesthetic upgrade without erasing its original character. The building’s modernist style, its history and the Społem brand, recognisable since the interwar period, become the hotel’s distinguishing feature: the interiors refer to hotels of the second half of the 20th century, and the neon Hotel sign echoes the typography of the co-operative’s best-known logo. The building is divided into nine functional zones: an entrance hall, a restaurant with its own entrance and terrace, staff facilities, a conference room with an upper hall, guest rooms, a pool and spa zone also open to outside visitors, two technical zones and a green patio. Intervention in the massing is deliberately minimal: replacing the demolished western terrace with a hall and restaurant, reworking the roof above the hotel floor to form an internal patio, and rebuilding the parapets. The green patio brings daylight to rooms without external walls and guarantees every room the same quality of view; triangular bay windows give guests privacy, while windows above them provide excellent daylight. The patio also lights the wide corridor by the conference room, used during conference breaks.
Conversion of part of the PSS Społem building in Gliwice into a 3-star hotel
1ST PRIZE IN THE ARCHITECTURE COMPETITION, 2017
Design team: Mateusz Gierszon, Ewelina Siestrzewitowska, Antoni Surowiak
energy standard: compliant with Technical Conditions (WT)
IDEA:
The main premise of the project to convert the Gliwice Shopping Centre for hotel use is to modernise the building technically and aesthetically without losing the original character of the object. The project uses the building's modernist style, the object's history and the owner-investor's brand for the hotel's promotion. The Społem cooperative brand, dating from the interwar period, gained extraordinary significance and recognition in the second half of the 20th century. We propose that this coherent heritage, together with the current fashion for the clothing, industrial forms and architecture of that period, become a distinguishing feature of the hotel. The proposed architectural interventions therefore aim to emphasise the characteristic features of the building's modernist mass; the interior design refers – without abandoning contemporary tendencies – to hotel interiors of that period; and the styling of the 'Hotel' neon refers to the typography of the most popular Społem logotype.
FUNCTION:
The building is divided into 9 functional zones:
1. Entrance hall
2. Restaurant with a separate entrance and an external terrace.
3. Cloakroom and sanitary facilities for hotel staff
4. Above the entrance hall and restaurant there is a technical zone with suspended air-handling units serving both these zones.
5. Conference hall with an upper hall, with sanitary, storage and stage back-up facilities.
6. Hotel-room zone. The 'external' rooms have windows in the southern, eastern and western facades; the 'internal' rooms have windows overlooking a green patio. The zone contains 39 rooms.
7. The pool and SPA zone has direct connections both with the hotel-room zone – for guests – and with the upper hall – for 'external' clients.
8. Within the floor and above the first-floor rooms there is a technical zone with air-handling units
9. The green patio zone makes it possible to guarantee the same standard (view and daylight) in all hotel rooms, and also daylights the upper hall and the corridor by the conference hall. At the same time, to protect guests' privacy, free access to the garden is not assumed.
CHANGES TO THE BUILDING MASS:
Given the adopted functional division and the general idea, the rebuilding of the mass is limited to:
1. demolition of the external terrace on the western side, replaced by the entrance hall and restaurant,
2. rebuilding the roof over the hotel floor to create the internal patio,
3. rebuilding the attics
Building the internal green patio allows full-height windows in hotel rooms that have no access to external walls. Shaping the external walls as triangular bay windows ensures residents' privacy and a view of a suitably composed garden. The patio is fairly narrow – so it does not take up much usable floor area. Thanks to upper daylighting windows above the bays, the rooms are very well lit. The hotel patio also daylights the wide corridor by the conference hall, used during breaks, raising its class and functionality. Rebuilding the patio requires transfer beams, dismantling part of a structural beam and removing some roof prefabricated elements.
ARCHITECTURE OF THE BUILDING:
Given the design task – converting and modernising a shopping-centre building with an attractive, characteristic and clearly defined mass, and its historic surroundings – the architectural design had to meet the following conditions:
1. take into account the modernist heritage of the shopping-centre building, meaning both care not to lose the basic principles of shaping its mass and creating new elements that harmonise with the modernist character of the existing building,
2. unite the dispersed western facade, full of masses and installation elements, into one coherent whole, and increase the importance of the facade along Norberta Barlickiego Street by placing entrances and services at street level – thus appropriately 'framing' the hotel entrance,
3. unite the newly designed entrance-hall and restaurant elements with the existing mass,
4. take into account the building's historic surroundings by shaping suitably subdued architecture in form and colour and by designing a 'frontal' character of the facade along Norberta Barlickiego Street.