Private Brussels

Appendix

Structural Logic (1) Central Beheer Herman Hertzberger Apledoom (NL) 1967

The building is a settlement, consisting of a larger number of equal spatial units. They are comparatively small and can accommodate the different programme components (or ‘functions’), because their dimensions as well as their form and spatial organization are geared to that purpose. Main features; small scale spaces generate a complex large netwroked space; no hierarchy between elements; free circulation.

Structural Logic (2) Inland Steel Building SOM Chicago (US) 1958

The Inland building was designed to display the performance of the material that the Inland Steel Company was trading with. The structure and also the service elements, such as elevators, toilets and facilities, were taken to the outside to create an open free plan. It also became representative of an efﬁcient and ﬂexible plant, since the space of work was surrounded by 4 facades and no interior columns.

Structural Logic (3) Sears Tower Chicago (US) 1974

One of the early examples in which cor-ten steel is used in structure and exterior ﬁnishes to resist weather conditions. The building is in the center of a planned seting surrounded by a garden. All buildings are connected by a glass-covered bridge.

157

Membrane Novartis-Fabrik Str. 4 SANAA Basel (CH) 2006

The exeptional narrow width of the ﬂoor plan encompasses an architectural concept of membrane or perimeter. The ofﬁce spaces therefore is pushed to the facade, that having a minimum thickness, areaches a great level of transparency and peremeability. The inner courtyard is left empty as the void that the ‘envelope’ building generates.

Large atrium (1) Ford Fundation Kevin Roche New York (US) 1968

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Private Brussels

Published on Jun 23, 2017

AA Projective Cities

Offices and administrative buildings have become ultimate commodities of the real-estate market. The European Union’s administrative buildings are almost identical to commercial offices, despite representing a public and democratic institution. The EU has become post-political – with economic consensus prevailing over social or democratic intention – rendering it devoid of any civic ambition to contribute to the city. In Brussels, the office typology has developed in its most agonizing form, since public institutions have no control over its premises – only driven by the opportunism of the market. Thus, the dissertation departs from an analysis of the alienating case of the European district in Brussels, challenging the failures and missed opportunities of privatised architecture and restrictive technocratic masterplanning. As an answer, the ‘interior’ appears as a meaningful instigator of truly civic space, and as a means to subvert these administrative buildings from within.