Olympic Village Refurbished in Elstal by Berlin

The elliptical House of Nations was once at the heart of the Olympic Village in Elstal, a town near Berlin. The skeleton construction of reinforced concrete, which was erected from 1934 – 1936, served as a dining hall for the approximately 3,600 athletes who were accommodated in the surrounding residential buildings. After standing empty for many years, the building has been repurposed as apartments. Stipulations for historical preservation were to harmonize with the desired energy-efficient building shell. 

Due to large-format glazing and a lack of masonry, there was little room for a conventional thermal insulation system at the House of Nations. Instead, planners chose a mineral, non-combustible insulating plaster system of the Heck Aero iP type. According to the manufacturer, layers over 20 mm thick of this breathable plaster achieve an insulative effect that fulfils the requirements for minimum thermal insulation as outlined in DIN 4108. Applied by machine, the plaster creates a homogeneous texture without hollow spaces or heat bridges. 

On the east-facing façade of the House of Nations the horizontal groove texture of the historical façade plaster, which was once created with stonemasonry techniques, was to be copied as precisely as possible and applied to the insulating plaster. This work was based on a special Rajasil formula for scrubbed plaster with added red and yellow chippings. The grooves have been pressed into the plaster rather than combed onto it to prevent the coloured granulation from tearing away from the surface.

© Heck Wall Systems

The offset levels of the towers have been treated with Heck Aero iP insulating plaster before being coated with horizontally textured scrubbed plaster. The remaining façades of the towers, as well as the complex’s elliptical boiler house, have been coated with a conventional, 80-mm insulation system of rock wool. JS