Located between Rotterdam and Leiden, Zoetermeer is a city built for mass, for the greatest common denominator. Zoetermeer as a physical entity (the way it looks on the map) is a city of districts, clusters and an urban centre. However, you tend to experience Zoetermeer in quite another way. This project is about Zoetermeer as a mental entity (i.e. the way you experience it). It is about being constantly in transit. About non-places like shopping malls and motorways, but also ticket machines, standard building materials, codes and conventions. Not a design against Zoetermeer, but not a slavish imitation of it either. Rather, it is a process which reinterprets Zoetermeer one step at a time. The brief is an existing one. Sundry cultural institutions in Zoetermeer are to combine in a cultural centre: the schools of dancing, music and drama, the academy, a film and video club and the local music collective. Aided by relational diagrams the present project begins by analysing the brief. Next, the brief is divided across the given site in blocks. To give 'form' to the blocks I chose the proportions of a sheet of A4 paper. In addition the relationships between the institutions comprising the centre are 'stretched', so that the spaces between blocks overlap and are experienced in another way. In this experiencing of space there is constant reference made to Zoetermeer. There is, for example, a roadside restaurant (the cafeteria), a chip shop (the bar), a garage with surveillance (the warden), a paper supermarket (the paper store), station toilets etc. In the last analysis, the space-between forms a succession and an overlap of Zoetermeer experiences, punctuated by highlights assembled from standard materials. The rest of the building is concrete (i.e. a grey mass). Regarded as an object, the building is a container in an outdoor car park. The façade enfolds the container like wrapping paper, Ferrari-red.

Place of education: Rotterdam
Specialization: architectuur
Tutors: Ton Venhoeven, Jan van Heemst, Hilde Heynen, Liesbeth van der Pol & Paul Bosse