The complex of the former Winternitz Automatic Mills in Pardubice, one of the first implementations of the architect Josef Gočár, ceased to serve its purpose in 2013. A year later, it became a national cultural monument. Our intention was to integrate the listed building into the new complex, where it will have a central position. The city, the region and a private person participated financially in the whole event. The aim was to create a new multifunctional urban space for cultural, educational institutions, and private activities. Thus, a kind of triangle of important urban spaces and objects was created, consisting of the Renaissance castle, Perštýn Square and the complex of the Automatic Mills.

By removing some existing buildings, we enhance the dominant frontal portal with the entrance arch and at the same time allow an unobstructed view of the entire site from the side of the historic part of the city. The creation of two new public spaces, which intentionally have a different character and function, is absolutely fundamental from the point of view of the revitalization of the mills. We confirm the main entrance with a designed square with a sycamore bosquet, where a water channel made of bricks for irrigation is led to each tree. It is primarily a quiet, representative entry point, but we assume that, for example, markets can be held here. Inside the new complex, we are creating the Mill Courtyard, which will be a lively space for holding exhibitions, concerts, or theatre performances in the open air. The proposed public spaces are considered only for the movement of pedestrians.

An integral part of the overall concept is the colour solution. The entire complex includes a number of objects of various functions, which were treated by four architectural studios. It was therefore very important to coordinate individual plans together. Our effort was to harmonize all new interventions into a uniform colour that follows the existing brick colour of the Automatic Mills. With this, we wanted to make the entire area more unified, including the walking areas, which are made of bricks and red mortar. The variety of individual objects with various functional uses should not create a chaotic impression.

The new building of the GAMPA and Sféra encloses the proposed block of the complex of the former Winternitz automatic mills in Pardubice from the north side. These are two objects financed by the city, each of which has its own special programme. The Gallery of the City of Pardubice – GAMPA – is located on the ground floor, and the object of the Central Polytechnic Workshops – Sféra levitates above it. We left a gap between the two with a view to the surroundings so that the large mass of the new building does not act as a barrier. Thanks to the elevation of the Sféra building, the quiet necessary for students’ work is ensured on the higher floors, while GAMPA, which is located in the lower part, is more connected to the public space.

The gallery represents a kind of plinth; its roof is also publicly accessible. The building is completely brick and connects to the public space of the Automatic Mills, which thus acquires another dimension by the fact that an amphitheatre for 250 people is located here, where a number of open-air events can be organized in the summer. The outdoor scene is covered by the cantilevered part of the workshop mass and it is possible to completely cover it with a retractable blind. From the public space, the visitor can enter directly into the foyer, where the reception, cloakrooms and toilets are located. Furthermore, it is possible to continue directly to the gallery, which goes around the entire circumference of the area under consideration and is designed over two floors. We primarily work with overhead lighting in all exhibition halls, then in the main area we deliberately allow a view from the window towards the main entrance to the entire mill complex. The gallery is divided into several rooms that can be closed with sliding and accordion doors. Therefore, a number of different exhibitions, or one larger exhibition, can be held here. In summer, it is possible to completely open the parterre with the help of sliding walls towards the courtyard and allow a greater connection with the interior of the gallery. The offices are located on the second floor and are accessible via a separate staircase. In the opposite part of the treated area, there is a residential studio intended for the work of visiting artists.

Sféra is located above the GAMPA and is accessible by two staircases, which at the same time create a static support for the object. The workshops are intended primarily for primary and secondary school students and offer top-class equipped classrooms and laboratories for teaching technical and natural sciences. The entrance hall on the fourth above-ground floor, where the reception and cloakrooms are located, can be reached through the main entrance on the ground floor, which also serves as an entrance to the gallery. Vertical communication is enabled by both the mentioned staircases and lifts, while we always declare one as the main entrance and the other as an escape route. Each of the two floors has two classrooms on the sides, namely workshops or laboratories. A staff room is located next to the entrance hall and classrooms. There are toilets opposite. In the very centre of the building, we designed a two-story projection space with a centrally located sphere on which it is possible to project and simulate the natural phenomena of our planet. The lower floor of the textile, graphics, wood, and metal workshops has natural window lighting. On the contrary, the laboratories of physics, chemistry, natural science, and robotics on the top floor have overhead lighting with skylights covered by shades in the form of pyramids. On the same floor as the laboratories, we also find a room with a spherical playground, which is intended for preschool children and where they get to know natural and physical phenomena in the form of games. For better orientation, in collaboration with UMPRUM (Academy of Arts, Architecture, and Design in Prague) teachers and students, we designed creatively negotiated niches that respond to individual workshops. Collages were created from wood, textile, metal, and graphic matrices. In part of the roof there is a boiler room with an engine room, accessible by one of the vertical staircases.

When solving the object, we asked ourselves the question of the truthfulness of the architectural expression. Our answer is recognized construction and material design. Where we see the bricks are actually masonry load-bearing walls, where there is exposed concrete, it is a load-bearing concrete structure, and where there is weathering-steel sheet cladding, there is a non-load-bearing shell of panels. The effort was to design a coherent material design in the interior and exterior. The lower part of the gallery is brick, and thus follows the industrial construction of the mills. Brickwork not covered with plaster does not only mean a reference to a monument-listed building, but it is a natural effect of the wall itself, which plays a central role in shaping the space. It is a “bare” wall that does not need to be covered, but requires careful craftsmanship. The same can be said about other structural elements, such as ceilings, walls, and floors. The entire building tells us what and how it was really made. We colour matched all the materials to the brickwork. In the case of concrete, almost 30 different samples in the form of cubes had to be cast before the colour could be mixed. We decided to wall these cubes into the brickwork in the entrance hall as a memory of finding the right shade. In the case of the workshops, we used coloured concrete for the structures and floors.

The construction of the workshops is based on load-bearing concrete ribs in a grid of 3 × 3 meters, which support X-beams at the edges near the façade. We are helped to bridge the nine-meter spans by one-meter beams with openings that allow the installation of approved distribution systems in the interior. Thus, classrooms do not have to have additional internal supports. X-beams are a kind of hybrid perforated wall, which at the same time ventilate the entire building around the perimeter. Light panels with insulation, covered with weathering-steel sheet, are placed on the outside.