Constructed between 1984 and 1990, the Spiral House is an apartment complex designed by Zvi Hecker in Ramat Gan, Israel. The design of the building resembles an enlarged staircase that spirals upwards. For construction, Hecker felt free to experiment with different materials. For instance, he preferred to use materials associated with poor neighborhoods such as cheap pink stones often found on the walls of falafel shops. Furthermore, the pieces of mirror curling on the ceilings are among the recurrent elements of Hecker’s architecture.
The spiral form creates geometrical terraces while curling around a central courtyard. From this aspect, the apartment complex’s design is similar to typical Arabian village houses in which the roof is also a part of the living space organized around a central courtyard.
Due to its spiral form, Hecker describes his design as a “miniature Tower of Babel.” On the other hand, Shmuel Grobstein who collaborated on the design thus comments on the structure: “looks like a storm passed through Ramat Gan, picking up all the wrecks from the roofs and yards, and created the spiral in one swoop.” Nevertheless, Hecker won the Rechter Prize for architecture in 1999 thanks to his design of the Spiral House.
