Project Overview

The all-round and sustainable building design "Elements" was selected by the city of Amsterdam as the winning design for the realisation in the new Amsterdam city district of Amsterkwartier.

Project Commissioner

Kondor Wessels

Project Creator

Koschuch Architects / Arup

Project Brief

With its iconic, sculptural form, Elements completes the Amstelkwartier's skyline.

The Amstelkwartier has a pure urban design with clear 'Amstelkoppen' and sharp corners. Elements enriches the skyline of Amstelkwartier and Amsterdam with an elegant, solitary, 70-meter tall tower. With its light, all-round, metropolitan character, it relates to the other high-rise buildings, and forms a prominent and recognisable benchmark. Thanks to its unique sculptural character, it simultaneously obtains its own identity with multiple inviting faces, which shows a changing perspective from different angles. Sharp corners and setbacks are softened by the rounding of the horizontal lines and the play of light on the glossy and matte bronze-coloured materials.

Project Innovation/Need

Elements was not designed in a traditional way, but had developed from the various aspects that influenced the assignment, such as the urban envelope, the sun's orbit, daylighting, optimal energy generation, water collection, influence from the wind, and inclusion of green for more biodiversity. All these elements are included in a parametrically designed 3D model in collaboration with Arup.

Hundreds of variations were subsequently generated, from which the most optimal and thus also the most sustainable model was ultimately selected through a series of analyses. In the final design, the houses, as well as the PV panels that are incorporated in the balcony edges, have optimal sunlight. The wind climate on the street, on the roof garden, and in the courtyard, has been optimised as well.

For the substructure of the residential tower, Boom Landscape designed a roof park and an inner garden with lots of green and trees in the open ground. On top of that, the entrance on the side of Bella Vistapark will have a winter garden with subtropical plants.

Elements will feature a broad mix of housing typologies. On the one hand, because this meets the demand of many Amsterdam residents. On the other hand, because many different housing types attract different target groups, which together can form an inclusive residential community. In this popular location, we build large and smaller homes, for rent and for sale, with high quality and private outdoor spaces. Especially noteworthy is the fact that the studios (middle segment with rent) are nicely situated between the owner-occupied homes, and that we offer the double-height loft at great height with buyer options for the floor plans, unique in the Netherlands.

Sustainability

Elements will be an energy-supplying residential tower: from BENG to ENG. With the solar panels integrated in the balcony edges, more than 100% of the energy requirement is generated sustainably. Even more innovative is the hybrid wooden-steel-concrete support structure. This should save more than 50% on the CO2 burden of the used materials. By creating a concrete floor every six meters in height, with wooden floors in between, space has been created for double-height houses where the connection between the two layers is also flexible and adaptable. After all, that wooden floor can quite easily be given cut-outs or extra floor surfaces. Moreover, by creating a radical separation everywhere between the carrier and the installation, between the support structure and installations plus finishing, the houses are also much more flexible in terms of the future.

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