Basel: First new building in Baloise Park opened
Baloise is inaugurating its new corporate headquarters on Aeschengraben in Basel. It is the first of three new buildings that, together with the existing building, will form Baloise Park in the future.
After five years of construction, Baloise's new corporate headquarters on Aeschengraben in Basel, very close to the SBB railway station, is now officially open. The new building, named Baloise Park Süd, was designed by the architects Diener & Diener from Basel and comprises 12,000 square metres of gross floor area, office space and the Baloise Art Forum on the ground floor, where parts of the insurer's art collection will be presented in future. A special feature of the 34-metre-high building are the window panes, which are a good seven metres high, rounded off towards the square and each extending over two storeys.
In addition to Baloise Park South, the ensemble consists of three other buildings: Baloise Park East, where the Baloise training centre is located, Baloise Park West with a Mövenpick hotel, and Baloise Park North. The building at Aeschengraben 21 dates from the 1980s and has been renovated. A total of 1,300 office workplaces and 264 hotel rooms have been created on the site between Aeschengraben, Parkweg and Nauenstrasse.
Mövenpick hotel does not open until 2021
The ten-storey, 42-metre-high Baloise Park East was designed by Graubünden architect Valerio Olgiati and is characterised by clear forms and a reddish concrete façade. Baloise is setting up its training centre on the first three floors of the building with its atrium, and there is also office space and a fitness centre in the building. The total contractor for Baloise Park South and East is Porr Suisse; the contract is worth over CHF 110 million.
The top seven of the total of 24 floors in the 89-metre-high Baloise Park West high-rise will also be used as office space. Otherwise, the building, which was designed by Basel architects Miller & Maranta, will house the 4-star superior Mövenpick Hotel. It is scheduled to open in the first quarter of 2021.
"For us as Baloise, Baloise Park is not only a real estate investment, but also the new Group headquarters and thus our commitment as Baloise to Basel as a location," says Chairman of the Board of Directors Andreas Burckhardt. Baloise Park makes the company visible in the city in a completely new way. "With the ensemble of three new buildings by three different architects, the city is also gaining as a business location and as an insurance centre." (ah)
