Office building in Kaunas | Architectural Bureau G. Natkevicius & Partners

During the period of Kaunas Independence, the corners of the regular rectangular blocks used to be higher, it was fashionable to emphasize the corners with taller building or tower to emphasize and express the block.

One of such corners that beautifully closes off a block is the intersection of two streets in the old town, where the Kaunas Fire Station was designed and constructed by the famous interwar Lithuanian architect Edmundas Frykas in 1930.

It is considered one of the finest examples of functional architecture in Kaunas and is regarded as a masterpiece. The Fire Station building is curved, as if sculpted, and it closes the block not with an acute angle, but with a reverse one.

Meanwhile, our plot closes with a sharp angle another block, which is right next to the famous Fire Station. Interestingly, this plot is not rectangular but rather triangular in shape - it is where three streets converge, resembling three blocks that converge into a point, ending with a single building.

For a significant duration, there was a lack of design implementation on this plot due to the presence of abstract design - the customer was not a private person, company or manufacturer, but the state, i.e. abstract customer. This location was part of state property, without private ownership or individual plots.

However, around 2018, with the emergence of private property, a plot was formed at this end of the block. Our client was a private person who aimed for a commercial building and had a vision that the premises could potentially be rented by a bank.

Architecturally, this plot, this corner, is indeed complex. It is not a simple place, and that's precisely why no one found the key or the answer for many years to why it was so challenging to design a suitable building here.

The reason lies in the fact that the Fire Station is one of the interwar masterpieces of Kaunas, one of the best buildings in the city, making it extremely difficult to design something in its neighborhood. To avoid overcrowding and excessive embellishments, but to design an equivalent structure, not an inferior one, in such a neighborhood.

The streets coming from the old town are predominantly lined with low-rise buildings, and specifically this plot is bordered by one or two-story buildings, making it quite challenging to harmonize that scale.

The Fire Station stands tall, three stories high, around 16 meters in height, while one-story buildings line up from the old town, making it difficult to find a compromise between what the Fire Station is - a significant structure and those small wooden houses in the vicinity. This posed architectural challenges.

Therefore, a different approach was taken. The problem of the plot was emphasized by creating a transparent, glass building that could be seen around the entire perimeter, from all sides, at a 180-degree angle.

Through its glass-like appearance, all the streets, the old town, the river, and its opposite bank are visible, while its rounded shape allows the gaze to slide past the building, without obstructing the view of the old town structures, and at the same time it seems to flirt with the Fire Station building. If the Fire Station has an outwardly curved radius, as if sculpted, this building, on the contrary, is deliberately designed as some kind of rounded detail.

The plot is very small, and archaeological requirements were enforced. The search was conducted to determine if there were any historical archaeological layers, and despite that, parking spaces were necessary for the building. It was quite challenging to install an underground parking in such a small space within the operational street area. Therefore, an underground garage was excavated under the entire volume of the building, and other parking spaces were designed under the belly of the building on the first floor. The first floor is slightly recessed, while the upper floors appear to be expanded and hang in the air like a cantilever.

The building is like a triangle with rounded corners in a plan. The front corner faces the river and Karaliaus Mindaugo Avenue, while the other two corners face the old town.

The building is clad with large, 50 cm deep aluminum louvers to soften the impression of a mundane glass structure. The glass is left exposed only on the ground floor, while the upper floors are enclosed with louvers, allowing for a segmented viewing angle and protecting the glass building from the sun. The louvers create shade and a microclimate inside - the view remains exposed to you, yet you remain completely invisible.

To give the building a touch of architectural flow, two asymmetric towers were designed above the standard height, creating attractive asymmetry from the otherwise perfectly symmetrical structure.

This is a particularly well-constructed building with beautiful structural elements, such as cantilevered columns - this is one of those cases where even in a small area, the building structure is very aesthetic and expressive.

Lead architects: R. Pučka, A. Rimšelis, G. Natkevičius
Project managers: M. Jucius, T. Jūras
Sructural engineers: M. Vaidelys