Architect David Adjaye has revealed plans to group nine of Frankfurt's existing cultural institutions onto a combined campus in the heart of the city.

The 16.5 hectare site is currently occupied by Frankfurt University but will be vacant by 2014.

Adjaye Associates are proposing to create a single shared foyer, which will connect each of the nine organisations.

Apartments, offices and shops will also be included, creating a mix of uses across the site.

We recently featured David Adjaye's 2002 project Dirty House as part of our celebration of design in the London borough of Hackney. See the project here.

Here are some more details from Adjaye Associates:

Cultural Campus Frankfurt - Adjaye Associates
Architectural concept: "micro city"

The design concept rests on the extraction of the essential components of a city, which are then compressed to establish a mixture of different uses. The single ingredients become a city in microcosm, or a “micro city”. Within the composition, there are possibilities for people from the cultural industries, academics, residents and office workers to encounter one another within a rich, creative atmosphere. The design fosters interaction and animation thus resulting in new synergies between different creative disciplines.

The "micro city" comprises a central, public and multi-functional space, which combines the main performing spaces of the cultural institutions, retail, cafes and the market hall in an interesting juxtaposition within the main foyer. Forecourts on the perimeter accentuate access points to the main foyer also enabling circulation through the cultural campus, which is porous and open to the city. The different uses are also layered vertically, thus allowing the mix of uses to be carried into the topography.

Client: Forum Kulturcampus Frankfurt e.V.
Programme: urban concept study for a cultural campus which includes 9 cultural institutions and their main performing spaces and a mixture of other uses (retail, cafes, offices, residential)
Appointment: feasibility study
Site Area: masterplan site in total 16,5 hectares
Building Height: foyer 9m and main performing spaces 17m, higher buildings 25-54m
Number of storeys: foyer and main performing spaces I, higher buildings VI - XIII
No. of Offices: 13,0%
No. of Apartments: 33,7%
No. of Retail: 8,6%
No. of Cultural Use: 44,7%
Cladding - materials: glass/ stone