Duesseldorf Arcaden

The large-scale, multi-faceted community center is the product of a cooperative competition with active involvement of local residents. The design takes into account the urban character and history of this former container terminal as well as the typography and the dense perimeter block housing of the neighborhood.

While it preserves the district’s characteristic features, the design also reinterprets them for urban and landscape planning purposes to achieve the project’s set goals. In the first phase, the Dusseldorf Arcaden district comprises a shopping center with office space, three residential buildings, local services including a library, an indoor swimming pool and a community center, an underground parking lot as well as a community park achieved by expanding the listed Florapark botanical gardens. A prominent feature of the design is the man-made slope on the premises of the former train station with an elevation change of up to six meters. The new retaining wall acts as an urban façade, becoming the hallmark of the new development project and housing a wide range of the district’s important local services behind it. Thanks to its commitment to integration, the design optimizes the space required for parking and housing relative to the neighborhood. A plaza with a broad ramp and staircase at the entrance to the community center guides pedestrians into the heart of the new district. Bordering the park on three sides, the new complex gives all of the individual units a frontage onto the green space.