With the new hall of residence on Schwere-Reiter-Straße, the Munich Student Union has realized what is currently the tallest timber building in the Bavarian capital. A project that shows how timber construction can also be implemented technically and economically in building class 5.
The architectural firm hirner & riehl architekten stadtplaner bda, which has been working in timber construction for over 20 years, won the competition organized by the Studentenwerk in 2017. Construction began in 2021 and the project was completed in 2024. The office led by Martin Hirner and Dr. Martin Riehl built two structures of different heights, with eight and five storeys respectively, which are connected by a single-storey low-rise building. There is a green roof terrace on the low-rise building. Together with an existing student residence, the new buildings form a student residential quarter in Schwabing, close to the emerging creative quarter on Dachauer Strasse.
The hall of residence offers a total of 241 places for students and space for five children. It comprises 153 single apartments with their own kitchen and bathroom, 14 three-person shared flats (36 places) and 16 two-person shared flats (32 places). Four apartments are designed to be barrier-free and ten residential units are intended for parents with children. The offer is complemented by communal rooms for leisure activities such as music, artistic activities and cooking together.
With the exception of the base floor and the two emergency staircases, all load-bearing walls and ceilings in the interior as well as the façade were made from local spruce wood. The use of 1,840 cubic meters of spruce wood made it possible to store more than 1,600 tons of CO₂ in the building. Martin Hirner points out the importance of the choice of materials: “Cement production generates 8% of global CO₂ emissions; we architects need to act as a driving force for a rapid rethink among all those involved in the construction industry and, above all, in the choice of materials.”
In addition to the CO₂ savings, the short transport routes, the simple processing options, the low and recyclable waste and the almost unlimited life cycle through reuse also speak in favor of wood as a material.
Fire protection for a class 5 timber building posed a particular challenge. The solution comprises two independent, mirror-inverted stairwells in solid reinforced concrete construction, which serve as separate escape routes. Statically, the building was erected as an R90 construction in continuous solid timber construction. The timber façade meets the corresponding fire protection requirements for external walls.
The building is designed for long-term usability and potential conversions. The cross-laminated timber ceilings span from the central corridor to the outer wall and not from apartment partition wall to apartment partition wall. If necessary, this design allows almost all apartment partition walls to be removed without interfering with the load-bearing structure. The slightly higher material costs are thus offset by a high degree of flexibility in terms of floor plan.
The suspended timber façade can be completely removed in a few simple steps and can be exchanged or replaced with a different material if required. Almost all components are screwed together or can be separated with little effort to allow the materials to be reused at a later date.
In contrast to many modern timber buildings with pre-greyed timber cladding throughout, the façade of the student residence sets colorful accents. Martin Hirner describes this as an adaptation of the subtly pronounced colors of the Schwabing Gründerzeit buildings with their contrasting cornices and pronounced window reveals. Differently colored wall panels, widely projecting red fire bars in the form of cornices and colored window reveals refer to these historical models.
The construction method using prefabricated elements enabled an efficient building process. Every day, prefabricated wall and ceiling elements were delivered “just in time” to the timber construction company’s assembly hall and fitted precisely. A complete floor was built every two weeks, allowing the interior work to begin during construction.
An ingenious mobility concept made it possible to dispense with an underground parking garage, saving costs of 2.5 million euros. The concept includes 49 car parking spaces and 496 bicycle parking spaces.
The building was constructed in accordance with ENEV 2016 – KFW 55 standard. Heat is supplied via district heating/CHP, hot water is provided via a fresh water station. The gross floor area is 10,000 square meters with a gross volume of 30,000 cubic meters.
The taller of the two structures (east tower) has eight storeys with the top floor of the uppermost common room at a height of 22 meters. The building is considered an unregulated special building.
hirner & riehl architekten und stadtplaner was responsible for the architecture and fire protection. The structural design was carried out by Sailer Stepan und Partner (Munich) and Pirmin Jung (Sinzig). The landscape concept was developed by lab Landschaftsarchitektur brenner (Landshut). IB Bauphysik & Akustik (Göppingen) was responsible for the building physics and acoustics, while Konrad Huber (Munich) was responsible for the heating, ventilation and sanitary engineering. VE plan (Pfaffenhofen) was responsible for the electrical planning.
The project was publicly funded by the Bavarian State Ministry of Housing, Building and Transport.
Read also: Housing and daycare center in Olching by hirner & riehl architekten
