Korbach
Town hall
Korbach, Germany / 10.2019 - 11.2022
In the historic town centre of Korbach, the medieval town hall, dating from 1377, was extended with a new building. To this end, an extension dating from the 1970s was first demolished. On behalf of the District and Hanseatic Town of Korbach, PORR building construction Region West carried out the shell for the new town hall extension. A distinctive feature of the project was the processing and reuse of mineral materials from the previously demolished building.
Facts & Figures
Company
PORR Hochbau West GmbH
Type
Office buildings
Runtime
10.2019 - 11.2022
Town hall extension in Korbach using reused demolition materials
New building within the historic town hall complex
The new building is directly adjacent to the listed town hall, which dates back to the Gothic period. The extension comprises two four-storey sections. With additional front gables, the design incorporates elements of the historic building. PORR’s scope of work included earthworks and drainage works, concrete and reinforced concrete works, masonry works, as well as the construction of the architectural concrete façade using precast reinforced concrete elements.
Exposed concrete for stairwells and the council chamber
Selected areas of the new building were finished in exposed concrete. These include parts of the stairwells and the council chamber, where exposed concrete class SB3 was used. The façade was also partly constructed from precast architectural concrete elements, thus forming a further visible concrete feature of the new building.
Materials from the dismantling reused
The project was based on an urban mining concept developed by the ARGE agn-heimspielarchitekten consortium. During the selective dismantling of the 1970s-era building, mineral building materials were recovered, processed and subsequently reused in the new building.
The recycled aggregate was used, amongst other things, for backfilling foundations, in the frost protection layer, in in-situ concrete and in precast elements of the architectural concrete façade. Materials from the previous building were thus reused in various areas of the new town hall extension.
From the existing building to building materials for the new construction
The town hall extension links the historic existing structure with a new building, whilst simultaneously reflecting different phases in the approach to the existing building. Parts of the dismantled 1970s structure were not completely removed from the material cycle, but were processed and incorporated into various components and layers of the new building. The project thus demonstrates in concrete terms how existing mineral building materials can be reused in new construction.
