New Rolex building

In Milan, the design commission for Rolex’s new repair and logistics centre was originally meant to transform an existing 1950s building in the Porta Romana area of the city into something strikingly different to Rolex’s 19th-century offices in the city centre. Studio Albini, renowned for its sensitive reinvention of old buildings, created a design for an entirely new building: an ultra-modern structure featuring highly refined steel and technical systems, and maximized green areas.

  The building provides servicing workspaces on the ground and first floors, and a cafeteria and conference suite on the top floor – the latter with wood-lined internal louvres. The service specialists have direct access to roof gardens. The courtyard contains a watch-servicing training school for 20 students – the first of its kind in Italy. The logistics and storage segment of the building is in the two-level basement. The building is neatly “split open” at the angle where the two streets meet, creating a light-filled, three-storey entrance atrium. The structural design – with supporting columns passing down between the two-layered glass facades – ensures that the floors on the servicing and conference levels were column-free, making it easy to reconfigure the workspaces if necessary.

Franco Albini described his designs as artigianato razionalizzato – rationalized craft. And that’s exactly what was involved in the design and fabrication of the Rolex building’s louvres and screens, which are the key features on its facades. The vertical metal louvres are motorized and automatically change angle as the sun passes across the street-facing elevations; and there are 1,000 stainless steel perforated screens, 1 mm thick, positioned between the double-glazing.

New Rolex building, Milan
Program: office building
Architect: Studio Albini Associati
Architect in charge: Francesco Albini
Engineering: Tekne Spa
Facade advisor: AZA e Ramboll
Work direction: Francesco Albini
Contractor: Ediltecno Restauri srl
Area: 5,680 sqm
Completion: 2016