Rhapsody in West Residential Development / TANGRAM architecture and urban landscape

Curated by Paula Pintos
MASTER PLAN, RESIDENTIAL • AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS
Architects : TANGRAM architecture and urban landscape
Area : 30000 m²
Year : 2019
Photographs : John Lewis Marshall, meijeske fotografie
Manufacturers : AutoDesk, Engels Baksteen, Geelen Beton, VPT Versteeg, Alkondor, Scheuten Glass, Trimble
Lead Architects : Bart Mispelblom Beyer and Charlotte ten Dijke
Design Team : Ton de Lange, Laura Rokaite, Abdessamed Azarfane, Pieter Doets
Clients : SSB/De Nijs JvS VOF CBRE Global Investors Netherlands
Engineering : Van Rossum (construction) Hiensch (installations) LBP|Sight (acoustics)
Landscape : TANGRAM architecture and urban landscape Schadenberg
Consultants : New Cheese Development
Collaborators : Urban Sync Cascoland
City : Amsterdam
Country : The Netherlands

Textual content description supplied by the architects. Rhapsody in West is a residential improvement located on a posh website subsequent to Amsterdam’s busy peripheral freeway, on the sting of the Kolenkit neighbourhood. Ten years in the past this space was designated one of the vital disadvantaged within the Netherlands, and redevelopment was lengthy overdue.

For a very long time, the undeveloped website had an necessary neighbourhood perform as a inexperienced house and assembly place. The troublesome job of realizing an in depth improvement temporary has been achieved via a novel collaboration between designers, builders, traders, metropolis council, and native residents. The initiative for the redevelopment was taken by TANGRAM Architekten, city planners City Sync, and artist collective Cascoland representing the neighbourhood. The ensemble gives an answer for quite a few challenges, reminiscent of noise, air pollution, power conservation, water administration, warmth mitigation, group building, and social security. It combines excessive density with loads of house for inexperienced and water. Moreover, it additionally nonetheless gives a gathering place for the neighbourhood.

To make the positioning liveable there are two ‘excessive again’ buildings that block the sound of the street. The residual noise is deflected by the rounded shapes of the blocks and partly absorbed by the facades and the abundance of greenery. As a result of there aren’t any parallel surfaces, the sound can’t reverberate. The result’s spectacular: the courtyard backyard appears like a metropolis oasis.

Cultivating relationship with the neighbourhood was essential to the success of the mission. That is why the previous assembly place was reintroduced, in addition to a greenhouse within the courtyard that serves as a central assembly level the place occasions are organized. There are services reminiscent of a visitor home and a industrial café and front room the place individuals can eat, drink, work, or comply with night programs. Proprietor CBRE additionally gives additional facilities reminiscent of shared electrical vehicles and bicycles and James service, run by “native heroes”.

Rhapsody is characterised by openness. As a result of structure of the blocks, there are all the time ‘eyes on the road’ from the residences and a transparent view of the general public house. 5 local people managers (4 of whom stay on-site) strengthen the contact between the residents and the encompassing neighbourhood. They maintain the general residing high quality and set up actions. The housing mission may be very versatile in its design. Completely different layouts of the blocks are potential, with residences starting from 50 to 110 sqm and even bigger, now and sooner or later. It takes into consideration the wants of (future) residents and retains worth for an extended time period.

Noteworthy is the extraordinarily good power efficiency. The whole complicated is an power manufacturing facility. The residents provide power to the grid after deducting their very own use. This is because of numerous measures, together with numerous photovoltaics on the roofs.

Robinson Adey