Amsterdam, IJburg
71 rental apartments
2600 m² commercial space
parking garage
client: Waterstad II, Amsterdam Amvest, Amsterdam / ING Vastgoed, The Hague
contractor: Heddes bouw, Hoorn
start: 2003
completion: 2005
image (overall view): DPI
The quest of three architect firms for differentiation within an unequivocal plan. Based on the rough draft by ELV architects for IJburg block 5, a retail centre with flats above it, two young firms (KZG - AEG) were invited to create partial designs for this block.
The means applied to this, was the "bar code". The project was cut up into pieces. Each of the three collaborating architects was issued with three different strips. The strips differ in breadth and height. Because the cuts run through the middle of stairwells, interior corridors and covered yards, the division seems rather random at first sight. They fit the rational construction structure perfectly, however. The image obtained is of a completely differentiated block, coherent throughout the smaller scale of the strips.
Our three strips have simple façades, and refer to unadorned nineteenth century industrial buildings. They offset the very explicit sections by our neighbours within the block.
The ground plans develop lengthways in the block. This has given the houses a lot of frontage surface. Most houses are adjacent to both the covered yards and the street. The large front windows may be opened completely, so that in principle each room can be changed into an outside space.
