This month’s 59-minute lunchtime meeting sees Chris Roche, principal of 11.04 Architects, winging his way to Hamburg. On the menu, as ever, is a discussion about one of the big issues affecting the design industry

This month I am lunching at a harbourside restaurant in Hamburg overlooking the construction site for the city’s new Elbe Philharmonic Hall, designed by Swiss architects Herzog & de Meuron. The building, constructed around a 1960s cocoa-bean warehouse, is set to rival Bilbao’s Guggenheim Museum for urban cultural bling. The restaurant is newly opened, but it has been designed to look like a classic restaurant from the past. I am lunching with Stephen Williams, a British architect and resident of Hamburg for 15 years; among other projects, he is responsible for the design of a number of bars and restaurants at Hamburg’s airport. The subject of our discussion is ‘site-specific architecture’.

For the benefit of readers, how would you briefly describe who you are, what do you do?

I have lived in Hamburg for 15 years, having begun here working for Will Alsop’s then-German office Alsop & Stoermer. I opened my own office in 2000 and have since worked for a number of leading German brands, including Siemens, Volkswagen
and Bosch.

How would you normally spend your lunch hour?

I normally work through the lunch hour, when the office is a little quieter, and take my lunch later, on my own.

What is important to you about a working lunch?

That I can spend it on my own and focus on the tasks ahead, either later in the day, or the coming days.

Does your office have a dining room?

We are based in a building with three restaurants below, so staff would normally spend their lunch there. We try and get out of the office as much as we can and use these restaurants as additional meeting rooms. Airports are widely regarded as non-site-specific places, and yet within Hamburg’s – in the coffee bar you have designed, for example – you have succeeded in creating a space which is both universal and local.

How did you approach the challenge?

We were asked to design a number of restaurants in the airside section of the airport, and we set out to provide a series of varied spaces which could be occupied differently, in much the same way as you may experience restaurants in the city.We describe these spaces as different communication zones –including one for seclusion – so whatever your mood and reason for travel, you could find a space to suit the occasion. It is rare to find this choice on an airport.

How would you define site-specific architecture?

In the instance of the airport, we chose a palette of materials that is an extension of the vocabulary of the airport, rather than alien to the immediate context. The materials are integrated into the whole. Architecture can only be successful if it is based on the site. We are currently working on a 22-storey office project in Hong Kong for a German client, and for that we have to work with a feng shui master.

Why is a sense of place important, and is it possible to create a sense of place within an airport?

It is entirely possible – airports are the new market-places. You have to create spaces at airports where people can come together and do business, not only to go shopping. Airports are the new gateways to the city, and it is increasingly important that a visitor’s first experience is a positive one, and memorable.

If place is important to an individual’s psyche, how does a young architect, originally from Port Talbot in Wales, find himself living and working in Germany?

I think in Germany, most of my clients are interested in quality and permanence. These are qualities that architects want to explore, and sadly there are limited opportunities for architects to explore these values in Britain today.

British architects are much admired – and are very successful – in Germany, with Norman Foster reconstructing the Reichstag and David Chipperfield reconstructing Berlin’s Neues Museum. Why do you think British architecture is held in such high esteem?

I think that British architects, not just British architecture, are highly regarded in Germany. British creativity is the key: approaching a problem from all different angles is a lot more interesting than approaching the design in a purely pragmatic and sequential way. The combination of these two cultures – German pragmatism combined with British creativity – leads to a successful architecture. Equally, British architects are seen as democratic, and in a country wary of nationalistic style, it is often easier for a foreign architect to be appointed for a major commission than a German one, in much the same way as it was easier for a Spanish architect to design the Scottish parliament building than an English one.

Historically, climate and geography were major determinants of site specific architecture, but the generic, deep-planned, air-conditioned office changed this. Can you foresee a reversal of this trend to combat recent climate change?

Certainly, in terms of passive environmental design. However, how can you make a 25-storey office building respond to the local climate when you cannot even open a window?You can only achieve site-specific design with certain building typologies, and the modern office building does not readily lend itself to this. However in the choice of materials, it is increasingly important that architects specify materials that have a connection to the building’s context. Equally, it is important to use materials in
an intelligent way, and this does not rule out sourcing materials from overseas when appropriate – for example, we often specify American carpet tiles that are carbon neutral and made from 100 per cent recycled materials.

Can site-specific architecture make a meaningful contribution to brand awareness?
We design spaces that are a communications platform for our clients’ products and values, and as such, the spaces communicate the values of the brand, therefore they are very efficient at communicating brand values – much more so than conventional media and advertising.

German architect Mies van der Rohe created a building typology for the modern office when he designed the Seagram Building in New York, arguably a response to the grid-iron plan of Manhattan. The building was copied badly in every city in the West – could his original be seen as site-specific architecture?

If you look at Mies van der Rohe as the master of modernism he created something special in New York which gave something back to the city – the creation of a public plaza in a city much lacking in public space. However, I think his imitators failed to interpret his typology in a site-specific way and gave little back to the city. Office buildings need to integrate themselves into the townscape and provide experiences at the ground floor that connect with the city, rather than turn their backs on the site.

The discussion comes to an end, but the debate will continue – what constitutes good architecture? And does good architecture have to be site- and culture-specific?

I reflect on where we are: the restaurant sits on the edge of the docks in Hamburg, a city originally shaped by its shipping industry. It remains the second largest port in Europe after Rotterdam, and yet the city, like its harbour, is being redefined by new industries which are more international than regional. If cities are no longer defined by their primary industry, perhaps it is more critical than ever that architecture remains responsive to its context, and in so doing helps to maintain a rich and varied landscape which communicates the shared values of its communities culture