During Napoleonic times, this building had been used to store supplies for the army. Before and during World War II it was used as an office and administration, and finally, after the war it was used as a warehouse.

For the city of Mainz it was and it is a very emblematic and valued building, and so they proceeded in changing its use, transforming it, after a profound renewal, in luxurious apartments, with the exception of the ground floor that is still dedicated to restoration.

State of the work

Because the building had been built in its totality based on parapet, it was essential to create isolation for the interior, since the façade had to be preserved. The holes for the windows were of a small format; even some were the size of a machicolation (orifice from where weapons were fired.)

Diagnosis

Due to the static functions of the vaulted ceilings, the windows’ lintels only measured 6cm; furthermore, 2cm of isolation had to be installed before placing the window, which only allowed for 4cm to place the windows.

Another added problem was the placing of high acoustic protection crystals on the windows. The requirements imposed by the Protection of the Patrimony Office were that to preserve the exterior thickness of the profiles as narrow as possible, true to the resemblance of the original windows. In the same way, the panes also needed to be of narrow measurements in order to correspond to the original ones.

Solution

Due to our experience in buildings that combine wood and construction (Fachwerkhäus,) we were able to offer the promoter the construction of a type of window, even though the profile were narrow, with a double cordon of acoustic isolation, following the requirements in order to achieve a high grade in acoustic protection.  The window frames were fit in construction, solving like this the problem of the external vision of the profiles (narrow), without lessening the high acoustic isolation qualities.

 Planos