Text 4 Austrian Sky Garden

Until around the turn of the 21st century, high-rise buildings were quite rare in Vienna. Here and there a radio tower or an office building would reach above the Austrian capital's skyline, but skyscrapers were so rare that the Vienna building regulations classified any building over 65 feet (20 meters) tall as high-rise.

So when the firm Coop Himmelb(l)au built a 25-story apartment tower, its height drew attention (Fig. 2.10). Also remarkable was its passive heating and cooling system supported by a high-tech, double-skin, climate-tempering glass facade.

Figure 2.10 - The SEG Apartment Tower by Vienna firm Coop Himmelb(l)au

To build a tower in Vienna, particularly for housing, was considered an absurdity until recently. Housing, it was generally agreed, had to be near the ground and, if possible, with direct access to a garden. Contributing to this attitude was that building into the skies had always been the subject of myth in Europe, as evidenced in the fabulous gardens of medieval paintings.

In isolated instances, skyscrapers are becoming the height of fashion, such as with the Commerz Bank in Frankfurt, Germany by Norman Foster. But so far, air space has gone largely undeveloped for high-rise-abstinent Middle Europeans.

Now Wolf Prix and Helmut Swiczinsky, partners of the firm Coop Himmelb(l)au, are making tall buildings more commonly accepted in Vienna. In the office of the "Coops" - the firm's insider-nickname - piles of paper sit on the desks beside high-end computers, representing the architects' dual respect for the earth-bound past and the cloud-seeking avant-garde.