Detail of the project ed. 2016

dominikuszetrum / meck architekten

Design­er	Prof. Andreas Meck
Loca­tion	Hilde­­gard-von-Bin­­gen-Anger 1 and 3, D‑80937 Munich
Design Team	meck architek­ten Prof. Andreas Meck, Munich Col­lab­o­ra­tori Wolf­gang Ammann, Peter Fretschn­er, Wern­er Schad, Wolf­gang Kusterer
Year	2008
Pho­to credits	Michael Hein­rich (DO_External1.jpg, DO_External2.jpg. DO_External3.jpg, DO_External4.jpg, DO_External5.jpg, DO_internal3.jpg, DO_internal4.jpg) Flo­ri­an Holzherr (DO_internal1.jpg, DO_internal2.jpg) Andreas Hor­litz (DO_internal5.jpg)

Pho­to external

Project descrip­tion

The Dominikuszen­trum, with its dis­tinct and pow­er­ful lan­guage of forms, con­sti­tutes a cul­tur­al and spir­i­tu­al cen­tre in the new­ly devel­oped dis­trict near Munch­en­er Nordheide.
It is a fit­ting coun­ter­part to the urban square, which is with­in eye­shot, in the north­ern part of the district.
Sit­u­at­ed in an archi­tec­ton­ic sculp­ture cut out of brick, the chapel and the social and cul­tur­al ameni­ties are grouped around a cen­tral con­tem­pla­tive courtyard.
Var­i­ous pas­sage­ways invite peo­ple to enter or to walk down them. The main pas­sage­way fac­ing the square also forms the sheath enclos­ing the extend­ed chapel.
The chapel is the spir­i­tu­al cen­tre of the complex.
The pro­por­tions of the chapel are derived from the gold­en sec­tion, both in ground plan and ele­va­tion. The room appears rec­tan­gu­lar only at first sight, for the two out­side walls have been turned slight­ly on their axis; the dynam­ics of the space cre­at­ed point to Mary, to the place of pri­vate prayer.
A large cleresto­ry win­dow allows day­light to pen­e­trate writ­ten excerpts from the creed, per­me­at­ing the room with meaning.
The under­coat for the light is blue. It cre­ates the inte­ri­or archi­tec­tur­al sheath of the chapel, fill­ing the room with spir­i­tu­al con­tent and aug­ment­ing the unique atmos­phere cre­at­ed by the light.
The blue room is the sym­bol of the heav­en­ly and the divine. It is also the colour of Mary. Based on the con­cep­tu­al design of meck architek­ten the room’s brick sheath­ing has been coloured blue in keeping.
The litur­gi­cal con­cept envis­ages the altar and the ambo being placed oppo­site one anoth­er. The cen­tre of the room, reserved for the ‘divine’, remains emp­ty. This con­cept very pow­er­ful­ly express­es the ‘com­mu­nio idea’. By stress­ing the cen­tre, it empha­sis­es the idea of the communal.
The five large bronze-clad gates can be opened to extend the chapel out­ward­ly: the envis­aged arrange­ment of the ambo and the pews turns the chapel into a pres­bytery and the cov­ered exte­ri­or area into a nave.

Illus­tra­tive project report
Down­load report

Pho­to internal

Tech­ni­cal drawings

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