Badehaus Seehotel Ambach by Walter Angonese

Photographer: Paolo Riolzi

The project for the „Badehaus“ inevitably had to start with the Seehotel Ambach.

The adjoining building was completed in 1972 and is – together with the ski boarding school in Stams (A) – to be considered as the most significant work of architect Othmar Barth. During the last years the hotel building was carefully restored by architect Walter Angonese, the bathrooms have been refurbished, three new rooms and a suite have been added alongside smaller interventions.

The next step to respond to contemprorary hospitality standards was the decision to build a Spa area and a swimmingpool in the lakeside park.

The „Badehaus“ has been designed as a freestanding pavillon in the hotel park: a shadow-building, which stays in the background of the main building. The swimmingpool on the other hand works as a joining element between the hotel an the irregular shape of the Spa.

Four elements - steam bath, sauna, rain room and toilets – clad in blackened oak bear the load of the flat timber roof. The marine flooring with its black joints is mirrored in the interior by the ceiling. The whole perimeter consists of floor to ceiling glazing. The sliding elements allow generous openings which make the border between interior and exterior disappear.

The element of the swimming pool is carefully placed in the topography of the lakeside park and references with its materiality the hotel building.

Design Team:

Walter Angonese + Flaim Prünster Architekten
Collaborators: Architekt Jacopo Vantini

Landscape architecture: João Nunes | PROAP
Construction engineer: Ing. Herbert Mair

Photographer: Paolo Riolzi