Hof van Leende

Detail of lighting as it is reflected into the translucent screen by the skylights.

Project Details

• Project Name: Hof van Leende
• Client: Foundation Valkenhof, Valkenswaard, Netherlands
• Project Type: integrated light art
• Principal Designer: Joost van Santen
• Design Team: Ir Hans Boots, Engelman Architects
• Executor: Rutger Heijmen
• Location of site: Combined Home for the Elder
• Dimensions: 30 metres × 1 metre
• Total Cost: 40.000 Euros
• Date of commencement of project: January 2005
• Date of completion of project: August 2006

View of the skylight in the hall.

The Product

The Hof van Leende is a multifunctional building with elder homes, a library and a home for disabled people among other functions. A central hall with glass facades on both sides functions as a street inside the volume of the building.

Colour and light are deftly translated into fascinating graphics by the skylights.

Skylights were installed along the full length of the hall. Coloured glass and mirror clad panes were used. At the level of the ceiling a translucent screen was placed onto which the daylight filtering in cast soft coloured images. Natural light is thus skillfully used to project colours and images into the hall, which change with time of day and season.

View of the skylight in the corridors.

Further, 12 skylights were installed in the corridors within the building. Each skylight is 1 × 1 × 1 meter in dimension. Mirrors are mounted on all sides of these skylights which make use of coloured glass as well. The translucent screens are here installed beneath the skylights and a similar play of shifting colour and light is achieved.

Credits

• Text: Courtesy of the architect
• Photographs by Joost van Santen, Courtesy of the architect
• Compiled and edited by Varun Ajani