This master plan for Almaty’s new financial district was prepared by SOM and they were undertaking the first phase of buildings. BASE-MK requested us to investigate the potential development on the phase 2 site, and to propose an architecture that would meet the aspiration of the emerging market there, as well as bring more advanced environmental design thinking.
Working with our sister office in Leipzig, Tagebau, we designed four separate buildings orientated NW-SE, each with two slightly curved office wings around a central atrium. The facade design is inspired by the profile of the mountains to the north. The visually separate buildings were all connected together at ground and lower ground level, with common restaurants, gymnasium and servicing plant. The proposals provided a total of 86,000m2 of offices, with parking for 1,000+ cars.