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URBANINTERVENTIONBiq and Korth Tielens’s housing at Leidsche Rijn, the Netherlands’largest Vinex estate, offers an urban counterpoint to thesurrounding development, writes Ellis WoodmanPictures by Stefan Müller

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In his new book, TownPlanning in the Netherlandssince 1800, the architecturalhistorian Cor Wagenaarconcludes that the construc-

tion of the Vinex estates is likelyto be the last concerted house-building campaign that his country undertakes.

Fast approaching its target ofdelivering 828,000 homes, Vinex— a contraction of Vierde NotaExtra (Fourth Memorandum,Extra), the 1988 legislation thatbrought the programme intobeing — has decisively addressedthe housing crisis that the

Dutch faced two decades ago. Now, Wagenaar suggests, “it isnot expansion which appears tobe the main challenge of thefuture, but the prospect ofdeclining economic and demo-graphic growth”.

While most Vinex projects hadthe good fortune to completebefore the downturn took effect,Leidsche Rijn, which lies to theimmediate west of Utrecht, wasalways going to require a longerdelivery period. By far the largestof the Vinex schemes, thiscommunity of an anticipated80,000 residents was initially

scheduled to be built by the year2025, but given Dutch develop-ers’ current rate of productionthat goal now seems optimisticin the extreme.

In fact, just about the onlyhousing currently on site atLeidsche Rijn is that being builtby housing associations. There issome irony in this. Vinex’smission was never simply one ofhitting housebuilding targets —it was also intended as a tool to help sever the Netherlands’long-held attachment to rentalhousing. In support of a decid-edly Thatcherite vision of a

Above: South-eastcorner ofBiq’s block.

Left: The eastelevation isloaded withmaisonettesat groundlevel andthreedifferent flattypes above.

EAST ELEVATION TO BIQ’S BLOCK

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The upstairs apartments inBiq’s building are accessed bya partly double-height corridor.

nation of owner-occupiers, theproportion of public housingallowed in any Vinex develop-ment was capped at 30%.

These tensions are clear to seeat Grauwaart, one of the neigh-bourhoods at Leidsche Rijncurrently in development. Theoverall masterplan for the estateis focused on a large, centrallylocated park. The area to thewest of the park is intended topresent a quasi-rural quality,while that to the east (whichadjoins Utrecht’s periphery) is tobe more urban. Grauwaart lieswithin the urban half. Its

Franz Ziegler-designed plan —each neighbourhood is thesubject of its own plan developedby a different architect — establishes a matrix of closedperimeter blocks, the scale andgrain of which are intended toevoke the character of 19thcentury Rotterdam. To date,however, the only completedblock is one undertaken by thehousing association Bo-Ex; allelse is open field.

This block is the work of twoarchitects, Korth Tielens andBiq, each of which has designedan abutting building with a

C-shaped plan. Korth Tielens’s isa three-storey terrace that frontsonto the green corridor thatforms Grauwaart’s westernboundary. Biq’s is two storeystaller and addresses the trafficked boulevard that formsthe neighbourhood’s spine.Grauwaart is almost exclusively adevelopment of houses, but bothof these buildings also incorpo-rate apartments.

Ziegler has generally sought toemphasise the house over theblock, by restricting plot sizesand employing a large number ofarchitects, but quite what those

expectations implied in the caseof the Bo-Ex block was far fromclear. Certainly, Biq and KorthTielens were resistant to the ideaof introducing a more pictur-esque massing than the typologydemanded. In the discussionswith Ziegler, the architectspointed to the presence of hospi-tals and prisons in 19th centuryRotterdam as evidence thatGrauwaart could survive thepresence of at least one block of amore monumental scale.

With that conviction in mind, they have employed anessentially common palette of

materials: the same beige brickand anodised aluminiumwindow frames, with precastconcrete being used forbalconies. As Gus Tielens puts it:“We made different meals fromthe same ingredients.” And yet, ifthe overall effect is more unifiedthan Ziegler anticipated, theblock’s elevations are by nomeans unmodulated.

What impresses is that eachchange of scale and depth isclearly the product not of ascenographic impulse towardsvisual busyness but rather adesire to communicate a

Biq and KorthTielens wereresistant tointroducing amore picturesquemassing than the typologydemanded

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SITE PLAN

Looking from the courtyardthrough the main entrancein Biq’s building.

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legible urban hierarchy. Evenwith no neighbours in place, wecan already surmise from thesefacades the kind of spaces thatthey will one day address.

It is also notable that theelevations’ expressivity is rootedin the complexity of the internalplan. Biq’s building employs aparticularly rich variety of apart-ment types. Its longest rangecomprises a run of maisonettes,above which three differentapartment types are loaded toone side of a 90m-long corridor.

On these bones, a symmetricalelevation of four quite distinctconditions has been hung. Thefirst is the central bay, focused onthe double-height opening bywhich the block’s interior isaccessed. Then, to either side, amore expansively fenestratedsection has been teased forward,extended a storey above theadjoining parapet and furtherdistinguished by the laying of itsbrick in an ornamental stackbond. Next, we reach a sectioncrowned by a parade of monu-mental windows — a register ofthe second-floor corridor hereexpanding to double-height.And, finally, the bookends —these again climb to five storeysbut are minimally fenestrated,the better to emphasise thedouble-height entrances bywhich the residents of the upperapartments gain access.

The ingenuity at play demandsproper study of the plans, but I have said perhaps enough tosuggest that the architect hassteered a course between therelentless and the capricious. The

The corners of Korth Tielens’s building accommodate apartments.

One of the corner blocks of Korth Tielens’s building.

FOURTH FLOOR

THIRD FLOOR

SECOND FLOOR

FIRST FLOOR

GROUND FLOOR

The architect points to studenthousing as an alternative.

All parking is accommodatedin the courtyard — one space perapartment — with amber fruittrees subtly extending the rangeof tones employed by the archi-tecture. A monopitched rooflowers Korth Tielens’s terrace bya storey on this side, with only thecorner buildings retaining theirfull height. Add to this mix thefive storeys of Biq’s facade and arun of single-storey brick bikesheds around the perimeter andthe space takes on a markedlyinformal quality — a sense rein-forced by the relaxed placementand sizing of the windows onKorth Tielens’s block’s facades.

From outside, however, theblock appears to belong firmlywithin the tradition of buildingssuch as Vienna’s Karl Marx Hofor the Adam brothers’ Adelphi inLondon — projects that makepalaces of mass housing. For allthe compact city rhetoric thatattended the Vinex programme’sdevelopment, the built reality has

proved overwhelmingly suburbanin character — a sea of villas andshort terraces, peppered withoccasional point blocks. The Bo-Ex block certainly offers acompelling counterpoint tomuch of what has been built atLeidsche Rijn. If we in the UKever get around to addressing ourown housing crisis, it could evenoffer a model for a differentvision of housebuilding entirely.

PROJECT TEAM

ArchitectsBiq (high-rise and inner court,site management);Korth Tielens Architecten (low-rise block)Client Bo-ExUrban design Franz ZieglerContractor BouwondernemingVan BekkumStructural engineerKonstruktieburo Krabbendam-BoerkoelServices engineer VIAC installatie adviseursCost consultant Bouwhaven

facade is a composition of partsbut a unified conception too.

The return elevations addresspark rather than street, a shiftregistered by their morepronounced modelling. Full-height bays in stack-bondedbrick alternate with recesseswithin which balconies of point-edly massive expression havebeen wedged. Each is formed ofa single piece of pre-castconcrete, coloured to approxi-mate the brick’s sandy tones andprofiled in a way that brings tomind a classical stylobate, levi-tated into the air. The closedform arguably makes more sensewhen employed on the courtyardelevations, where overlooking isa consideration, but its originsare evidently as much ornamen-tal as functional. After years ofexperience of the design-and-build culture of Dutch house-building, Biq has a strong senseof which details will necessarilyaccord with a contractor’s usualpractice and which might offeran opportunity for more bespoke

design. As in its housing atLakerlopen (Building study April30, 2010), it is the pre-castconcrete elements that here serveas the cherry on the cake.

As with all the buildings thataddress the boulevard, theground floor of Biq’s scheme hasbeen set 600mm above roadlevel, so as to lend it a moreurban character. By contrast,Korth Tielens’s terrace, whichaddresses parkland on all threesides, stands directly on theground. Its facades pick up onthe notched profile of Biq’s sideelevations but invest the treat-ment with a finer scale.

Each of its 21 houses presents

two bays, one set a metre forwardof the other, establishing a partic-ularly insistent rhythm when thefacades are viewed lengthways.An important characteristic ofthese views is the extent to whichglazing is concealed. The topstorey appears entirely blank —windows having been tucked intothe recesses — which placesadded visual emphasis on thebrick’s massing and texture. Aswith the neighbouring building,changes of bond have beenemployed to strike a note of soberornamentation. Lintels are facedin vertically oriented brick, as toois the more substantially dimen-sioned parapet, providing the

composition with an emphatictermination.

At the corners, the same essen-tial language has been deployedin freer form for two small apart-ment buildings. These have beendesigned to serve the needs ofpeople with psychiatric anddrug-related problems. The 24 units comprise about 40sq meach — well below the standarddimensions of a Dutch apart-ment — but there are communalcare facilities on the ground floorof one block. The charity thatmanages these buildings is rent-ing the space from Bo-Ex, butthere is an understanding thatthis programme might change.

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Korth Tielens’s building employsa notched profile, allowing top-floor windows to be recessed.

WEALTH OF AMBITIONThe masterplan for LeidscheRijn was developed by a teamled by Rients Dijkstra andpresented in 1995. Dijkstra’steam included an unusuallywide variety of disciplines,with BD columnist WouterVanstiphout offering advice inhis capacity as a Crimsonarchitectural historian.

The plan identified a seriesof “deregulating elements”as a means of lending thescheme specificity. Somederived from the existinglandscape while others, suchas the park at the heart of thescheme, were newlyintroduced. Among the keystrategic decisions was the

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Aerial view ofLeidsche Rijn.

relocation and roofing over ofthe A2 motorway to allow aneasy connection betweenLeidsche Rijn and Utrecht.

The plan states: “It took acity like Utrecht centuries togather the wealth it has today.Naturally, this richnessacquired through the agescannot be found in newhousing estates and this lackweighed heavily in the decision

of whether to build LeidscheRijn in its present location orsomewhere farther away.

“The easy access to Utrechtis, in fact, a major feature inthe image of Leidsche Rijn.”

When completed, it isanticipated that thedevelopment will constitute acity on the scale of Breda,accommodating a populationof 30,000.

SECTION LOOKING SOUTH