Haus am Südring
Sustainable development of an existing house
One detached house, two generations, one open staircase – and no door in between. The conversion on the Südring shows how one house can become two homes without anyone having to move out.
The son and daughter-in-law in the house, the parents in the attic storey – linked by an open staircase running through every floor. What had been conceived as multi-generational living meant, in everyday life: no door to close behind you, no conversation that stayed downstairs. And the staircase itself took up about a third of the house.
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The decisive idea of the conversion was not to beautify the staircase but to relocate it: to the north façade, facing the Südring. One intervention, three effects. The new stairwell acts as a sound buffer to the street – the loudest side of the house now works for its residents. One house became two separate dwellings with real privacy. And the living area grew by around 30 per cent per floor – without adding a single square metre.
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Added to this is the sustainable renewal of the existing building: a refurbished and insulated façade, new windows, photovoltaics on the roof, low-barrier routes for the years when steps matter. The proportions and roof form of the house are retained – from outside a confidently refreshed house in an established neighbourhood, inside a new order: sleeping on the upper floor, and in the attic storey a large, bright living room with the mountains outside the windows.
Haus am Südring stands for what lies within existing fabric: no demolition, no extension – one clever intervention that turns a floor-plan problem into the house’s greatest gain.
„It has turned out perfectly – we sleep upstairs, and up in the roof there is this huge living room."
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