HOSPER Landscape Architecture and Urban Design: The inner city Wiener location on Amsterdam’s island Oostenburg is transformed into a housing location. In an open planning process with surrounding inhabitants, new inhabitants, the municipality (centre district) and Heijmans Woningbouw, a plan has been made to realize 70 dwellings in the area. The architectural office Arons and Gelauff is responsible for the urban plan and the architecture, the outdoor space has been designed by HOSPER.
The Oostenburgereiland, and the site of Wiener & Co in particular, has a rich history of shipyards and slipways. The design for the new dwellings is consistent with this character. The plan is organized around a circuit of “slopes” and “courtyards”. The water dwellings and the water itself can be reached via semipublic green spaces. Thanks to the new underground parking garage, under the courtyard, the area is car-free.
The entrances to the dwellings on the waterside are situated around the courtyard. These single-family houses are oriented towards the water at a perpendicular angle. They are positioned in such a way that the space where the former slipways used to be, remains open and accessible so that the neighborhood gains public access to the water.
On the corner of the building block, along the water, a small block with loft apartments is built. These apartments are situated directly along the new square of Touwbaanpark with full grown plane trees.
New apartments are also realized along the Oostenburgervoorstraat, in new sturdy warehouse like buildings with an average height of 5 stories. The buildings connect to the scale and size of the existing buildings in the street. The public space along the Oostenburgervoorstraat is enlivened by commercial spaces and entrances in the plinth.
The design principle for the external space was to strengthen the perpendicular orientation of the dwelling blocks. Lifted planting boxes with different heights naturally create more communal and more private spaces around the ground floor entrances of the houses. A few of the edges of the planters are so designed that they can be used as benches for common use.
The difference between the slipways and the courtyards is emphasized by the difference in paving material and the distinct use of plants and trees. The slipways have a public character with a more industrial feel with the paving of large concrete tiles, whilst the courtyards feel more private and small scale with a brick paving material.
The adjacent public space of Touwbaanpark used to be a dark and unpleasant parking lot. It has been, in a parallel process to the Wiener&Co project, transformed in a new neighborhood park or plaza. Good use is made of the existing large Plane trees in the design. This area also used to be a slipway of the former shipyards industries. The height differences were used to express this former use, and the same paving material of the slipway in Wiener&Co was used. Around the existing plane trees lifted planting boxes are again situated perpendicular to the water edge, emphasizing the direction towards the water. The lifted planting boxes are desigend with wooden sitting edges, and a colorful use of white flowering grasses and plants. Hereby the outside spaces of Touwbaanpark en Wiener&Co location are connected and are much appreciated within this neighbourhood.
The Zuiderkerk Award is an award for the best housing project that was realized in Amsterdam the previous year. The jury was delighted about the outdoor design principle and the fact that both the public and private spaces were linked together in one project.
Landscape Architecture: HOSPER, landscape architecture and urban design
Designers: Hanneke Kijne, Raquel van Donselaar, Marike Oudijk
Other designers involved in the design of landscape: Arons & Gelauff
Client: Heijmans (dwellings), Gemeente Amsterdam (Touwbaanpark)
Project location: Oostenburgervoorstraat, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Design year: 2011-2016
Year Built: 2014-2018
Photography: HOSPER, Luuk Kramer
