Dezeen promotion: materials developer Rieder has created a three-dimensional facade from tailor-made, precast concrete panels for the Lichtfabrik office block in Berlin.
The office block, designed by German architecture practices Bollinger+Fehlig and Stoeckert Architects, has a distinctive facade made using Rieder's formparts.fab cladding system.
Located on Kottbusser Strasse in Berlin's Luisenstadt district, the block was designed as an extension of the Lichtfabrik commercial property to contain loft-like workspaces.
On the main street-facing facade, the block has large windows that flood the interiors with light. These are surrounded by three-dimensional, angled panels that give the building a contemporary feel and differentiate it from the neighbouring structures.
Built in an area with numerous early 20th-century factory buildings as well as commercial and residential blocks, the office had to meet a variety of monument-preservation specifications. 
Rieder's formparts.fab cladding, which is made from lightweight glass-fibre-reinforced concrete, replicated the feeling of the surrounding stone buildings, but in a modern way.
"If the virtually animated flowing dress stands for a maximum of formal freedom, and the faithful replica of a Berlin made of stone for maximum restriction, then this curtain wall is our synthesis, our way of echoing this discourse through the medium of construction," explained Michael Pape from Stoeckert Architects.
"By twisting the l...