ArtHotel Billie Strauss, Kirchheim unter Teck

Zaha Hadid has designed an unusual sculptural form to be built as an eye-catcher between two listed half-timbered buildings in the middle of the picturesque Swabian village of Nabern. It is intended to form a contrast with its surroundings and address provocative questions to everyday architectural experience.

Zaha Hadid's model for the planned extension to Billie Strauss's 1992 Art-hotel is made up of distorted geometrical shapes like ellipse, cross, spiral and star. They are arranged vertically to form a tower-like sculpture, framed by filigree steel scaffolding. The cross-and star-like structures are intended to serve as separate rooms in the hotel; they will be connected by a spiral staircase. The ellipsoid base of the sculpture, the blobby that has already been realized, partially sunk in a pool of water, will be used among other things for events at the hotel. A bridge set on the level of the spiral staircase links the project to the older building on the left, the first phase of the hotel.

Gallery-owner Billie Strauss and her husband, architect Manfred Strauss, have been running a wine bar in the half-timbered former village town hall since the early eighties. This was joined by the Arthotel in the old building on the left in early 1994. The half-timbered building has been retained in its entirety, and the interior arrangement of the hotel, designed and realized by Zaha Hadid with Billie and Manfred Strauss, is an expressive counter-design to the historical shell of the building. Distorted and exploded ground plans, surfaces that break through space and design that revels in colour present an extravagant contrast with the idyllic half-timbered building and prove the experimental gusto and creativity of the cooperating trio.