Geuzentuinen

Entry to parking garage.

Project details

• Project Name: Geuzentuinen
• Location of Site: Amsterdam, Netherlands
• Design Team: FARO Architecten
• Project Type: Multi-family housing
• Client: De Principaal
• Contractor/s: Bouwbedrijf van der Waal
• Site Area: 0.8 ha
• Built-up Area: 105 dwellings / ha
• Cost of Construction: € 14m
• Date of completion: 2003

Words from the architect

The Geuzentuinen plan is part of the urban restructuring programme for Geuzenveld and other western garden suburbs. Our contribution to Neighbourhood 9, a redevelopment area in Geuzenveld, forges a link between the lucid order of the classic perimeter block and the modernist ideal of the post-war garden suburb of open row development. Here 'light, air and space' proceed in concert with present-day demands for clear-cut and robust boundaries to the public domain, adequate solutions to parking, a high development density (138 dwellings on 0.8 hectares), personal safety, a mix of dwelling types and a readily identifiable architectural and spatial expression.

Secluded but not open.

The site divides into three to accommodate the surrounding pattern of streets. Each part contains a mix of ground-based and stacked rented and owner-occupied units in a combination of tall and less-tall volumes ranged round a communal garden. The stacked units are positioned for optimum sun lighting at places where they are least disruptive, with the largest and tallest portion on the north side.

Overview.

All facades are of aluminium and brick, with aluminium most prominent on the inner face and brick on the outer. Occasionally the two materials spill over into one another.

Urban regeneration.

Below each of the three inner courtyards with their (partly) communal garden is a half-sunken parking facility. A wall round the garden strictly separates the shared internal area from the outside world. The three blocks are semi-open. As a passerby you can peek in through a variety of gates, but only residents can enjoy the green interior spaces around which the blocks are build. Openness and safety go hand in hand.

Balconies.

Overview project.

Collective green.

Clustered around interior courtyards.

Aluminium facades.

Field on parking garage.

Pedestrian streets.

Credits

• Text: FARO Architecten
• Photographs: Luuk Kramer