An existing reinforced concrete building, built in 1968, consisting of a basement, ground floor and two floors, featuring a square-shaped plan view and an internal atrium.

The building was architecturally and statically pioneering for its time.

It functions as a Gymnasium and High School of the German School of Athens.

In 2001 it was decided to strengthen the building in order to improve its seismic behavior, following minor damages observed in the 1999 Athens earthquake.

The reason was the insufficient foundation of the existing reinforced concrete walls.

The strengthening of foundations and reinforced concrete walls had to be done mostly with the school in operation, with strong life-safety measures taking advantage of only the Christmas holidays, which made the operation very difficult.

The foundation strengthening interventions, which were gradually constructed, had to be carried out by excavating under the existing foundations, removing the soil, filling them with concrete in phases and enlarging their dimensions with reinforced concrete.

The reinforced concrete walls were also strengthened to the ground and basement levels by adding reinforced concrete and increasing their cross-section.

The building was completely restored, with invisible interventions.

After the strengthening of the load-bearing structure was completed, all the prefabricated elements and the marbles of the facades were fixed by mechanical means, so that they could be securely attached on the facades to any future earthquake.