Dem Dobrescu offices

• Type of construction: Office building

• Completion year: 2004
• Gross surface area: 1.450 sqm
• Levels above ground floor: 2
• Basement levels: 8
• Construction costs: 1.203.000 $

The object of the investment consists in an office building with 2B, GF+7F located on a land with a surface of 216,00 mp at 5 D. Dobrescu St. in Bucharest, on the East part of Revolutiei Square.

The peculiarity and difficulty of the said location is given by the fact that presently on it is located a decayed building classified as a monument due to its artistic and memorial-symbolic value linked to the historical events which took place in this area in December 1989. The town planning contect and the presence of the decayed building generated the development's concept, thought as a vertical volume with two sequences:
the old construction - kept only as a facade and punctually restored according to the historical studythe new construction - a glass volume with an abstract expression, inserted in the insides of the existent building's facade. By its color, transparency and position, the superior half is detached from the general volume
The cutting of this prismatic volume has a double sense, architectural, by emphasizing its relation with the existent decayed facade and town planning, by its sliding in the major space direction of Revolutiei Square. A special plastic and constructive implication consists in the relation between the "skin" of the old building, its facade and structure and the new insertion.The two elements are net dissociated both visually and strcuturally to the extent it was possible.

The facade of the existent building is reinforced by a steel concrete sheet with a thickness of minimum 15 cm anchored with the new structure. The height of a current level is of 2,85 m with a free height of 2,51 m a plate (22 cm, false ceiling 15 cm). The interior finishing has been chosen based on the spaces destination but also to make a contrast between the brick structure of the existent building and the new reinforced concrete structure. Thus, in the basement bar, the black granite (Nero Africa) of the floor ascends also vertically up to 1,20 m on the capping beam of the pilots marginally sustaining the foundation of the old building.

The presence of the new structure is signaled by the central tube and the beams bordering the stairs, left in exposed concrete. The black floor is continued also in the ground floor hall of the bar till the glass closing withdrawn in comparison with the facade plan and almost imperceptible, without exposed profiles, thus emphasizing the relation between the old brick structure and the new brick structure. The stairs connecting the two levels of the bar is integrally made of glazed stainless steel - main string (2U), stairs (3mm chequered plate) and balustrade (40mm round tube).

The ceiling of the ground floor hall which closes the office space at the lower part is made of Reynobond panels, glazed grey 906 similar to the metal-faced grey color of the curtain wall profiles. The same idea of making a contrast between different structures and/or materials - concrete vs. brick, concrete vs. granite - is found at the next level of the office entrance reception. the white walls alternate with the exposed concrete wall which anchors the old facade or with the round pillars casted in metallic casings in the same material. The interior floor granite (Yellow Rustic) has been chosen both for its warm tone and for the material continuity between interior and exterior. At the exterior, the new access stair is made of the same material which being sandblasted, is very close in texture and color with the limestonebase plate of the existent facade.

At the exterior, the curtain-wall is semi-structural, made of SCHUCO aluminium profiles, FW 50+system. The horizontal profiles are exposed, marked with strong relief covers and the vertical ones are withdrawn behind the glass, marked by the joints consolidated with silicone. The glass closing is made with Graberbel thermopan glass, distinctively colored in order to emphasize the volumetric intention: The higher volume, more open, uses a clear serigraphy-printed glass while the rest of the volume uses a glass mass colored in green-blue. The full areas of the plates withdrawn behind the glass (shadow-box) have the same color and are located in the same vertical plan as the sun proof inside elements (blinds). This way the facade's image is based on the transparency game between the glass exterior plan and the interior plan animated by the closed/open game of the blinds.

The facade of the old building keeps its current aspect, the interventions being limited to discreetly correcting or reconditioning the profiles and the degraded areas consolidating the contact with the curtain-wall by a trough disposed marginally behind the cornice.