Design: Nickl & Partner Architekten AG

Nickl & Partner Architekten AG has won the competition for the new Hamburg University Heart Center building.

The University Heart Center is a significant building block in the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE) development plan and an innovative building that will do justice to UHZ’s Europe-wide pioneering role in the field of diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease.

The jury gave special praise to the urban development integration into the existing buildings as well as the relationship to the adjacent a listed buildings to the south and the research campus to the north. Consistent with its outstanding technical importance and space-defining presence on the new, green UKE campus boulevard, the UHZ presents a confident, identity-defining image with its red brick façade.

The heart of the UHZ forms a central plaza that will become the building’s interdisciplinary meeting place and communicative centre. The UHZ’s clinics and nursing stations develop from this social focal point. Four landscaped and individually designed interior courtyards subdivide the building and give its users an opportunity for identification and orientation. As the jury emphasized, placement of the main entrance at the southwest corner and its orientation to the magistrale and open space results in “a generous entrance situation”.

We are delighted by this 1st prize!