Mineral fertilizers depot with rail siding

Project idea

The concept behind the mineral fertilizer warehouse project deconstructs the traditional storage facility image while maintaining full functionality through expressive form. A dynamic steel canopy, arched like a ribbon above the railway tracks, serves as the central metaphor: the warehouse appears as a rock formation with mineral-rich storage cells, while trains seem to leap over this artificial terrain rather than penetrate it. The facade structures and supporting column framework preserve the interplay of light and shadow across the interior space, evoking geological strata - creating an industrial landscape where architecture doesn't merely serve processes but poetically interprets the transformation of stone.

Project description

The building is designed in two interrelated forms: the main volume of the warehouse and the dynamic canopy belt. Their composition in the plan is built along the cutting line of railway tracks, where a rock-like structure meets the curved protrusion of the canopy, as if bouncing off the walls, overcoming them in a jump.

Facade "bones" are an external frame made of self—similar elements. They create two reliefs on different facades: their rhythm smoothly changes and goes beyond the boundaries of the usable area. Visually crushes the mass, like mineral inclusions in a rock. This technique not only reveals the metaphor of the transformation of the stone, but also balances the composition, imitates its own supporting frame and gives plastic expressiveness.

Technical information

The project is implemented based on standard structural solutions. The semi-open type warehouse without a heating system provides reliable protection of stored raw materials from atmospheric influences - wind and precipitation. The load-bearing structure consists of double-branch steel columns 13.2 meters high with an overhead crane featuring an operator's cabin and hook, while the roof rests on steel trusses with a 24-meter span.

The roof is designed flat with a minimal slope to ensure efficient water drainage and snow/dust shedding. For maintenance, cleaning and repair purposes, technical staircases are provided at the warehouse ends and along the volume perimeter.

Enclosing structures: the main volume is clad with transparent polycarbonate sheets, allowing maximum use of natural lighting for interior spaces, which complies with technological requirements for storage processes and characteristic solutions for magnesium and potassium fertilizer warehouses. External facade structures are provided to regulate ultraviolet radiation and create the required microclimate.

The facade "bone" - facade decorative system. Сonsist of steel frame elements clad with thin metal facade panels.

The ribbon canopy, clad with metal purlin sheets, forms a complex spatial composition implemented through self-supporting structures securely fixed to the main building frame.