For the Hafengebäude (harbour building) of the City of Bregenz an effective visual screen for 80 bays of full-height glazing was to be developed that would not impair the transparency of the building envelope. The starting point was provided by the need to interrupt the transparency, every 5 x 5 cm in black and white, with bars 2 cm high, for a certain viewing height. The basis for the concept is provided by band of text in the shape of a rhythmical, graphical system of symbols of an abstract binary basic code; instead of 0/1, black and white are used in the form of a boustrophedon cuneiform script. The text, which deals with the theme of glass and transparency and was written especially for this purpose, remains encrypted. Ultimately, what one sees are apparently randomly varied ornaments and a mysterious pattern. Our lives are increasingly determined by a communication system which essentially consists of two symbols and is generally concealed from us. The concept is based on making this system visible and, with it, the rhythmical structure and order of the text. An extract from the text: “ … comparable to the phenomenon when the reflective surface of the lake, fleetingly moved by wind and waves, acquires this fascinating shimmering quality that meditatively captures the eye and at the same time relaxes it…” Below the full deciphered text: In architectural parlance transparency is primarily associated with glass simply because we can look through it. But from outside, during the day and in the sunshine, large areas of glazing in buildings are never completely transparent. Through the reflection of the sunlight, the way the surroundings are mirrored glass buildings or glazed building parts can seem extremely massive, indeed hermetic, and from certain angles even dark and monolithic. From a distance, due to their reflective quality, they are highly noticeable, radiating space as it were, glittering like crystals. The idea of using digital patterns to break up the aggressive mirroring effect of such glass facades makes sense from a number of perspectives and is helpful in both design and functional terms: the ornament defuses the monolithic brilliance of the facades, giving the eye areas on which it can focus, whereas excessive transparency would create a safety problem in using the building. The crystalline surfaces relax in a pattern that introduces a certain grain, a suggestion of texture. A multi-dimensional layer is placed over the essentially mono-dimensional quality of glass, which creates a visual distraction and in semantic terms adds new layers and effects to the simple reflective aspect. In this way the material, whose surface repels everything, both visually and factually, is given a certain depth. The irritating aspect of the external effect is permeated, visually opened up for contrasting characteristics, more complex layers of meaning. Thanks to the printed pattern the architecturally intended transparency, the visual lightness of the building’s external and internal impact are retained, indeed even strengthened, as the reflective effects are limited, defused so to speak. In the harbour building the concern is the effect of lightness, dematerialisation, ultimately also of glass, which can best be achieved by ornamentation. With a pattern of this kind the glass of the building can relax in a pixel effect, comparable to the phenomenon when the reflective surface of the lake, fleetingly moved by wind and waves, acquires this fascinating shimmering quality that meditatively captures the eye and at the same time relaxes it…”

A new building, a facade around eleven metres high with a total length of almost 300 metres. The horizontal strips used by architects Koeb & Pollak in their design for the upper part of the façade are somewhat like splayed plumage, beneath them is a cladding of perforated trapezoid metal. Beneath the grid of the perforations is an underlay consisting of a grid of points. This “printed matter” on the wind protection membrane has an area of over 1000 square metres. These overlapping patterns engage each other in a relationship and develop something new – circular moiré effects that change constantly as you move and according to the angle you view them from. This makes the facade into a surface with multiple layers, a skin that represents both the building volume around which it is wrapped and the business accommodated inside.

On the occasion of the international year of forests and the plenary meeting of “Wald & Holz” on 21 September 2011 the Austrian forestry and timber industry presents itself in the Viennese parliament. The challenge is to make the “Year of Forests” visible in an effective way and to introduce it into this place, which, socio-politically, is the most important location for discourse. The concept consists of a spectacular installation in the columned hall of the 19th century parliament building designed by Theophil Hansel. Photographs of tree tops captured are printed on a translucent net that is spanned below the glass roof of the hall. The light that filters through the glass roof onto the 270 sq. m. of stretched material creates a striking illusion of the atmosphere in a forest. The marble columns of the hall become tree trunks, the roof of the hall a canopy of leaves. You look, as it were, into the sky, inhaling the air through your nose, fully registering the forest’s rich, earthy smell. Eight planed wooden planks – up to 8.5 metres long – are fixed along the row of columns and in large lettering convey important information about the value and function of forests and of wood. To complement the installation a magazine designed by Gassner Redolfi KG is issued in a large edition by pro Holz Austria. On a total of 16 pages it provides information about forestry and the timber industry, about forest people and wooden heads.

WOODDAYS are “best practice events” devoted to the theme of timber construction for greener, expanding cities. The core element of the “road-show” is a mobile exhibition box measuring 3 x 3 x 12 metres. The first stops on this tour initiated by proHolz Austria and planned to extend over a period of several years are Bratislava, Ljubljana and Milan, where a start was made on 21 March 2014. In terms of content the exhibition aims to present the evident potential of timber construction; in terms of communication it addresses the material’s thematic presence in urban space, its direct appeal and how it is encountered ; in design terms the focus is on eliminating the folksy quality, on the material’s haptic quality and elegance, while in terms of function the show concentrates on mobility and autarchy (through the photovoltaic supply of energy). On one side wall of the interior pioneering developments in the field of timber building are shown. Vertical text bars and illuminated panels showing examples of projects are inserted rhythmically in the timber structure. The wall opposite communicates the ecological arguments for forests and wood. This is done by means of eye-catching graffiti with in-depth messages that relate to the pictograms on the external facades. The entrance and exit at the ends of the box contain introductory texts, labels and display windows featuring attractive exhibits. The starting point for this action was the exciting exhibition “Bauen mit Holz” in the Pinakothek der Moderne. It was initiated and curated by Hermann Kaufmann, TU München and designed in collaboration with Atelier Gassner. The innovative German timber building expert Alexander Gumpp, gumpp&maier, working in collaboration with the department of timber construction at the TU Munich, was responsible for condensing the large exhibition for this small mobile exhibition box. This show is the predecessor of the WOODBOX and was awarded the Gold Medal for Exhibition Design in the European Design Awards 2013. The new box is optimized in terms of content and design and equipped for different languages. The event label created by Andrea Gassner is a further development of the trademark created in 2005 by Stefan Gassner for “european wood”. The striking façade logo on the outside wall is made by incisions in the black wooden cladding of the box, accentuated by a restrained use of colour. The line grid produced as a result is continued graphically in various marketing communication applications. Poster subjects with “forests of battens” and folders with bar charts are created.

The principal protagonist of this exhibition is the exhibition space itself – a wooden box in the form of a shipping container that is transportable and can be erected and taken down quickly. “schauholz” – the name and motto of the action are cut into the external walls in oversized letters. The short ends of the box allow a view into the interior. The contents of the exhibition represent a “distillation” of the large exhibition “Bauen mit Holz - Wege in die Zukunft”. Openings to introduce light are made in the structure of beams and posts that is exposed in the ceiling and the right-hand wall. A show of current timber construction is embedded in the opening, similar to an analogous slide viewing box. It presents the current importance and the architectural range of wood as a building material. On 120 plates the screen presentation offers a second way of reading the selected projects. On the untreated left-hand wooden wall various ecological and economic aspects of the raw material wood are presented in a memorable way by graphics that employ crate lettering. The starting point for the texts and illustration was the scientific consultancy work for the original exhibition by Gerd Wegener and Holger König, Munich. The show case in the rear area forms a stage for a spectacular model building. It terminates the exhibition space and, seen from outside, creates an attractive display window for the show.