Rahmen

Award: Herbert Eichholzer Architecture Award (City of Graz), 2019
Team: Maike Gold, Jana Holzmann and Bernhard Ogrisek
Site: Opera Garage courtyard, Schögelgasse (between Kaiser-Josef-Platz and Dietrichsteinplatz), Graz

Brief: Transform the existing hall into a glass greenhouse and replace the street-front building with a new public community building
Focus: Food, community, and urban learning (in reference to Kaiser-Josef-Markt)

"Rahmen" was developed for the Herbert Eichholzer Architecture Award 2019 and takes the Opera Garage (1933) by Herbert Eichholzer and Rudolf Nowotny as its point of departure—an almost unchanged structure hidden in the courtyard of a Wilhelminian block in Schögelgasse, between Kaiser-Josef-Platz and Dietrichsteinplatz. Responding to the competition brief, the project reimagines the existing hall as a glazed greenhouse and proposes a new street-front building as a civic “third place” dedicated to food, learning, and exchange—rooted in the everyday culture of the nearby Kaiser-Josef-Markt.

Conceptually, the design develops the “frame” as both structural principle and organisational logic: a layered framework spans the site, defines intermediate spaces, and forms a flexible system for cultivation, workshops, and communal programmes. Food education, seed-to-table routines, and a food-sharing point connect production with social value, while passive strategies—solar gain, natural ventilation, rainwater harvesting, and composting—support year-round use and underline the project’s ecological ambition.