In Germanys Magdeburg area, where the River Elbe
runs into the Mitteland Canal, several artificial lakes
had formed in the 1930s and gradually developed into
places of recreation and biotopes. The oldest of the
lakes, the Barleber See lake, has long been a bathing
beach and a camp site, while currently hosting the Jugend youth and community centre, with the guests being accommodated in bungalows and tents.
The architects were commissioned to design a reacernent for the run-down sanitation facilitu in the
camp, at the lake's northern brim. The approaching
tourist season urged the replacement to come fast, and
thus the client proposed a container sanitation unit.
The AFF Architekten constructed it out of three eye-
catching elements - standard containers, "crown roof “ with roof windows, and entrance porch from an outer wooden lagging. The choice of color as weil as added
roof and entry-way details make the container construction stand out as a unique icon of its environmen;
small touches have qiven the 5anitation unit an entirely new visual value.
Playful surfaces and colors make the construction
attractive for children. The texture tells about what the
house has experienced, whether it is friendly or unfriendly, what it is made of, and what you can do with it.
To bring the building closer to its users, and to break
the functional rigor of conventional sanitarg containers, pink was chosen as the color for the outside shell,
while associative wall patterns decorate the rooms inside. The patterns used in boys' and girls' changing
rooms are similar, get different in color and imagery,
with blue sharks appealing to boys and pink dolphins to
girls. The robust simplicity of the containers and their
fittings contains a narrative component, which gives
the children the freedom to pass on the story.
