Assembly Hall, Sorø Academy, competition entry
The meeting between architectural heritage and state-of-the-art engineering.
Project
New assembly hall for Sorø Academy
Client
Sorø Academy and A.P. Møller Foundation
Area
,200 m2
Architect
MIKKELSENARKITEKTER A/S
Collaborators
ARUP
Vision and cultural environment
Architecture has played a crucial role at Sorø Academy from the very beginning. Each new addition has been a worthy representative of the architecture of its own time, while at the same time enhancing the overall cultural environment of the Academy grounds. In the same way, the new assembly hall should reflect the strongest architecture of its time, but also fit in naturally as the latest addition to one of Denmark's distinguished cultural environments.
An outdoor space becomes an "indoor space." The former equipment yard is transformed into a unifying social hub in a strong cultural environment. A new building – both humble and ambitious – becomes part of a new, complex architectural whole where the dialogue with the existing 1820 environment creates a new cultural and sustainable relevance with a strong community-oriented identity. We want to create a new, strong balance where the existing cultural environment and new sustainable architecture are nourished by their mutual dialogue.
The new assembly room is based on and defined by the distinctive layout and architecture of the existing courtyard. The room will interact closely with the interiors of the surrounding buildings, creating a special functional, social, and spatial cohesion.
Sensuality and innovation
Although neither listed nor SAVE-registered, Avlsgården appears to be highly worthy of preservation, both in its own right and, in particular, as part of the wider cultural environment of Sorø Academy. The typological clarity of the breeding farm calls for the new assembly hall not to attempt to imitate the farm, but to stand on its own merits; partly as a strong statement for 21st-century architecture, and partly as a backdrop for the existing buildings of the breeding farm.
The 200 years that have passed since Avlsgården was built have seen many architectural and building culture developments. Today's architecture, to a greater extent than before, calls for a design language formulated in close dialogue with engineering, so that material consumption is minimized as much as possible, while buildability and comfort are ensured and verified.
The typology of the breeding farm, the cultural environment of the Academy, and contemporary construction will together create an ideal setting for an ambitious proposal for what socially oriented architecture and state-of-the-art engineering can achieve when combined.
The optimized geometry of the roof and the subtle edge columns ensure a new assembly hall that, independent of the Avlsgården structures, creates a light and airy space in which the school's students, teachers, and other users can experience the assembly hall as a town square. . This experience is emphasized by the fact that the new deck in the courtyard is constructed with a slight slope defined by the existing interior floor levels, so that the entire building will appear level and easily accessible.
Construction
The roof structure is designed as a freestanding structure, independent of the existing buildings surrounding the courtyard, and has a vaulted geometry that is shape-optimized to maximize its structural efficiency as a pressure dome. The geometry of the roof provides an effective load-bearing effect in the primary curved grid and eliminates the need for heavy bending elements that would otherwise be necessary to span the large distance in a more traditional, non-form-active roof solution on a flat surface. The dome height is set at 8.5 meters above existing terrain to optimize the efficiency of the structure while complying with the height restriction specified in the project brief.
The decision to design the roof as an independent structure was primarily made to avoid overloading the existing historic masonry structures, which would otherwise have required extensive reinforcement work and significant changes to the facades facing the courtyard. These changes would probably have included the introduction of a concrete ring beam at the eaves level and the reinforcement of cross walls to withstand the horizontal pressure forces from the new vaulted roof structure.
The geometry and spacing of the grid have been determined to achieve an optimal balance between structural efficiency, the roof's permeability to daylight, and division into manageable-sized flat glass panels. GL32h high-strength glued laminated timber has been chosen for the dome construction to minimize the cross-sections in the load-bearing grid and maximize the view of the surroundings. The load-bearing structure is based on a 12x11 division of the courtyard.
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