Netzwerkarchitekten completes community centre with a zigzagging golden roof

The basement level connects with the main body of the community centre via an internal staircase and lift. A large youth centre in a partial basement below the foyer has its own separate entrance. The main entrance, positioned in the centre of the building, leads into a double-height foyer with a parish hall to one side and meeting spaces, a kitchen and toilets to the other. Photography is by Jörg Hempel. Project credits:
Client: Mainz Episcopal Ordinariate represented by the Catholic Parish of St. The 420-square-metre community hall features a row of six conjoined gables, standing in contrast with its more traditional neighbour –   a Catholic church with a steeple and white masonry. German studio   Netzwerkarchitekten won a competition to design the St Gallus Community Centre for a church in the town of Urberach, just outside Frankfurt. Rooms are lit by a series of small windows and skylights positioned off centre in the walls and ceilings. The ground floor is designed as a multi-purpose space capable of hosting a variety of events. «Each group room has its own ‘house-in-house’ character through its own gable roof,» said the architects. A flight of stairs to one side of the double-height atrium leads to group meeting rooms under the peaks of the roof. The consecutive pitched roofs of this church community centre in Germany were designed by Netzwerkarchitekten to make the building resemble a row of terraced houses. The jagged roof structure gives a human scale to the interior of the upper floor.