The offices for the Federal Environment Agency were relocated to Dessau to promote economic development in the east of the country. The location in a former industrial area was selected to demonstrate the possibilities (and challenges) presented by a brownfield site. Contaminated land has been treated, and both a small existing railway station and a former gas appliance factory have been integrated into the complex. The new volume is inserted as a structure of transition between the city center and the historic buildings of the train station, both joined by a park. The overall form of the building was designed so that a large portion of the site could be transformed into a linear park accessible to citizens. The complex is entered via the Forum, a crescent-shaped, covered space that draws the park into the building and acts as a foyer to the public facilities that include a library, a lecture hall, and an exhibition area. The offices are then accessed through a landscaped atrium, around which the various departments of the agency are arranged. The new building combines a compact, highly insulated volume with strategies of passive engineering and the harvest of renewable energies; in particular a large geothermal heat exchange system and a variety of solar panels...[+][+]