Sipro Engineering office building

The Vrbina industrial and business zone is located in the south-eastern part of Krško, along the Sava River. The dominant feature of the area is undoubtedly the Krško Nuclear Power Plant, with its 30-metre-high reactor surrounded by a network of power lines and orchards. The area was created as an extension of the production areas of the Vipap paper and pulp mill, although new activities related to energy and pharmaceuticals are rapidly changing the character of the area. The open space is characterised by arrays of orchard trees, which continuously surround islands of freestanding production and administration buildings. The street grid is of secondary importance and does not contribute to the perception and orientation in space.

The building of Sipro Inženiring, a company with a strong energy focus, follows the prevailing urban pattern of larger, autonomously sited building units surrounded by green spaces. It is designed according to the principle of continuous addition and expansion. The open ground floor allows for gradual infill with complementary activities. On the eastern side, it is technically and structurally possible to extend the building by less than half without compromising the function of the main building. The office space on the first and second floors is designed to be flexible, so that the layout and structure of the workspaces can be changed over the lifetime of the building.

A double-height auditorium runs through the central, “dark” part of the building, with the intention that all employees, even though they are divided over two floors, can also meet spontaneously and informally and maintain the awareness that they are working in the same team. The auditorium ensures that all the building’s users are interconnected and connected.

The ground floor is dedicated to a larger production and analysis workshop, a larger daily meals area, an entrance lobby and other spaces that will be adapted to the needs of the development of the Vrbina business zone.

The building’s design feature is its diagonal structural design on the south side. The flexible skeletal design does not provide sufficient seismic stiffness, so this part of the building had to be reinforced with diagonal supports. The structure remains visible as a characteristic identifier of the building, the company and the potential seismic dynamics of the Krško Basin.

A deep steel mesh shade is also suspended over the glazing layer and the structure. The shade is dense and deep in the south and shallow and sparse in the north. It also allows access from work areas. The east and west façades are more enclosed due to the problem of the low angle of incidence of the sun. To the east is a double-rung evacuation staircase, which complements the diagonal design of the structure. On the west side, the larger meeting room is screened by a decent motif, similar to the one along the south façade. The building provides natural ventilation on the north and south sides, allowing fresh air to flow through the whole of the building. Excess heat from the overheated air is also dissipated through the basilical light ring above the inner auditorium.

The design and construction of office buildings in the last few decades, especially on the outskirts of Slovenia, has been mostly subjected to compact box-like designs, enhanced by coloring of the building’s facade based on the owner’s brand image. With the Sipro Engineering office building, we consciously avoid this practice. Through thoughtful structural design, flexible content and passive shading, we add key visual and contextual accents to the generic rectangular volume, giving the building a distinctive, honest and authentic character.

Authors Matej Blenkuš, Katja Cimperman, Aleksander Cifer, Grega Valenčič