Building in downtown Athens, built in 1982 by reinforced concrete and operating as the headquarters of the Goethe Institute in Athens.

It consists of two sections, which are separated with an expansion joint: the higher building structure with 7 floors, ground floor and two basements, which mainly hosts classrooms, as well as administration and teachers’ offices, and the lower building structure with two basements and ground floor, which hosts event lecture halls.

The building is renovated from an architectural and electromechanical installations point of view and strengthened against earthquake and fire.

The interventions must be done in the shortest possible time and with the utmost safety, so as not to interrupt the operation of the Institute.

The load-bearing structure of the higher building has a particularity in terms of its vertical elements, namely the position and the number of columns changing from the roof-slab of the first floor and up and from the roof-slab of the sixth floor and up.

At these levels there are strong beam grids to carry the static loads.

The roof slabs from the second to seventh floor are beams’-free and lie directly on the columns.

The higher building features 2 cores along its whole height, symmetrically positioned, hosting elevators, staircases and other auxiliary spaces.

The low-rise building has large slab spans, about 20 meters long, made of post-tensioned concrete.

Evaluation studies of the existing buildings have shown that there is a need to strengthen their load-bearing structures, both against static and seismic loads.

In the 7-storey building, the interventions method provides strengthening of the cores’ reinforced concrete walls and the restoration of the cores’ cross-section continuity, with the addition of steel sheet profile and intermediate layers of high strength concrete in the critical areas.

At the same time, some openings on the sides of the cores are annulled.

Also, the 4 columns of the main building are strengthened up to the first floor, by means of steel-sheet jacketing and enlargement of their cross-sections with high strength concrete infill.

The beam-grids of the first and sixth floor roof-slabs are strengthened against bending and shear stresses with carbon fiber stripes and the beam-free slabs are strengthened against punching over the heads of the supporting columns.

In the lower building, the ground floor roof-slab is strengthened against bending and shear stresses with carbon fiber stripes and the expansion joint between the two buildings ceases to exist.

Furthermore, the four corner columns that support the roof of the lower building, are also strengthened.

As part of the architectural redesign, it is being built – inside the 7-storey building – a new staircase leading to the first floor, where there will be a new event hall, as well as a ramp on the ground floor to facilitate circulation in the large hall which will be turned into a library, a meeting room and a study hall.

The facades acquire a new architectural design and the atrium courtyard acquires new shading elements and a refreshments’ room – cafeteria to serve the needs of the public.