Ferrum 1 is one of several buildings that architect Sergei Tchoban’s Germany-based studio, Tchoban Voss Architekten, has designed for the site of the former Rossiya factory in St. Petersburg’s Polustrovo district. The name of the office building is the Latin word for iron.
The name references the Cor-Ten steel façade as well as the history of the former industrial site on which the structure was erected. The sculptural façade is constructed in a geometric grid and presents itself as a coherent, dynamic, organically flowing fabric of loose “warp and weft” threads.
The building is crowned by a band of golden aluminum panels, whose sheen visually offsets the intense coloring of the main façade cladding. “Rust on the outside, gold on the inside” is Ferrum’s central design theme.
Photo: Ilya Ivanov
