New details on OMA's Norra Tornen twin towers in Stockholm

OMA recently revealed new details on the Norra Tornen twin towers -- formerly titled Tors Torn -- since they won the competition in 2013. The distinguishly faceted 100-meter towers, which are named Helix and Innovation, are being designed to be the third tallest twin skyscrapers in the Hagastaden neighborhood of Stockholm.

The mixed-use buildings will consist of private residential apartments, a bar and exhibition space, and public amenities like a health club, library, children’s center, and retail areas. The project is scheduled to break ground in 2015.

More details below.

Project description:

"How does one make a project from ingredients one is usually keen to avoid? What repertoire should be invoked when (modern) architecture’s most instant reflexes: asymmetry, prismatic volumes and smooth exteriors instantly prove impossible?"

"The two inherited building envelopes, each a kind of ‘crescendo’ composition of different heights – neither slab nor tower – prohibit the unfolding of an uncompromised typology. Conversely, the opted program: apartments with an em - phasis on large outdoor spaces, prevents too literal a translation of the envelopes into architectural form."

"The chosen approach could be characterised as a kind of ‘Freudian flight forward’: a passionate embrace of the inevitable in order to conquer and overcome one’s initial fears."

"The prescribed building envelope is adopted as a given; its initial vertical segmentation is complemented by a second, horizontal segmentation that gives the buildings’ exterior a single, homogeneous treatment: a rough skin, formed through an alternating pattern of withdrawn outdoor spaces and protruding living rooms."

"The manipulation of the initial building envelopes, however slight, somehow radically transforms their initial premise. An implied architecture of monumentality gives way to an articulation of domesticity."

"An intended urban gesture originally subject to a singular interpretation: “gate to the city”, triggers multiple readings. A once formalist structure comes to house apartments that are surprisingly informal... one could even say humanist."

Project credits:

Norra Tornen
Status : Design Development
Client : Oscar Properties
Location : Stockholm, Sweden
Site : Torsplan, Stockholm
Program : 304 apartments, Retail

COLLABORATORS

Structural Engineer : Arup
Mechanical Engineer : Arup
Façade Engineer : Arup Façade Engineering
Local Engineer : Sweco
Fire Safety : Tyréns AB
Acoustics : ACAD
Fire Safety : Tyréns
Code consultants : Tengbom

All images courtesy of OMA.

Click the thumbnails below to see more project images.