Design: In the summer of 2016, architecture students from TU Kaiserslautern worked together with refugees to create a community building in the Spinelli district of Mannheim. The students also developed the building themselves. The construction of the building primarily helped the refugees to integrate into the social environment. The building consists of an open community space with a three-sided courtyard, an introverted relaxation room with a garden, a kiosk and a workshop.
Wood: The building is of timber construction. In order to save costs and to make good use of the hands of all those helping, the structures chosen were simple and material-saving, but labour-intensive. This is symbolically reflected in the walls and beams, which are made of vertically and diagonally arranged slats and attached to a high-performance structure, giving the building a unique architectural appearance. A special technical detail: in the case of lattice beams, the structure is transferred from the timber lattice walls to the load-bearing beams, resulting in a load-bearing structure with a span of 7 metres.
