1st Central-European Architectural Magazine for the Culture of the Environment

Diving Platform Millstatt

Photo: Christian Brandstätter

New Architecture / Piranesi 46/47

Diving Platform Millstatt

Hohengasser Wirnsberger Architekten

Minimal Further Construction on the Monument

by Lukas Vejnik

On the northern shore of Lake Millstatt an usual diving platform from the early 1930s, visible from afar, characterises the beach silhouette. Sonja Hohengasser and Jürgen Wirnsberger gave the distinctive facility a restrained and elegant overhaul.

Source: Municipality of Millstatt Archiv

With its diverse lake landscape, the federal state of Carinthia naturally has favourable conditions for the development of a public bathing culture. The lido with a striking mountain formation in the background is still a frequently used narrative on postcards and in tourism advertising. The first attempts to accentuate the shorelines with high-quality buildings that use fewer materials go back at least to the baths of the late 19th century. The Werzer Bath developed by Josef Viktor Fuchs is well preserved to this day, a playful filigree wooden construction with covered verandas and connecting bridges for the guests of the summer resort in the Bay of Pörtschach on Lake Wörthersee. Another early bathing infrastructure is the Millstatt Lido Bath planned by Arnold Heymann in 1925. As an expressive highlight, an elegant diving platform made of ready-for-painting concrete with a slide was placed in the middle of the former promenade with its characteristic awnings in the early 1930s. The influential architecture critic Friedrich Achleitner saw it as a landmark for the Carinthian lake district.

Photo: Christian Brandstätter

Project Data
Architect: Hohengasser Wirnsberger Architekten
Client: Marktgemeinde Millstatt am See & Millstätter Bäderbetriebe
Planning: 09 | 2015 – 10 | 2018
Start of building: 01 | 2019
Opening: 08 | 2019
Examination of concrete structure: Baulabor der Forschungsgesellschaft der FH Kärnten
Structural engineering
Urban & Glatz Ziviltechnikergesellschaft, Wolfgang Steiner ZT

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