Taking the transformation of an industrial enclave in the Oud-West district of Amsterdam as its stepping-off point, this design seeks to redevelop the former tram depot on site into a multicultural bath house. The plan focuses primarily on the question of how to go about retaining the cultural value of the existing in a recycling operation.

The depot's cultural qualities lie not just in the masterly application of materials but perhaps more so in the way the building relates to the city. This relationship is that of the industrial enclave as a whole and can be understood in terms of 'secrecy' and 'intrigue'. At the heart of the enclave is an enormous conglomeration of historically valuable industrial buildings. When Amsterdam was expanded in 1901, these buildings were kept as much out of sight as possible inside a ring of standard city blocks, in line with the ideas of those days. The hidden industrial estate can only communicate with its urban surroundings by way of so many metres of fencing. Once inside the vast, quiet spaces of the enclave, it is as if one has entered another world.

With the depot recycled as a multicultural bath house, the monumental enclave will have been opened up while preserving its valuable historical isolation. This sense of isolation, originally to hide an 'unsightly' industrial complex, is invested with new meaning: a guarantee of intimacy, a requisite for bathing. The transformation intensifies the characteristic elements on site. Thus, for example, the sheer expanse of the sheds can be exploited for visitors to gradually infiltrate the complex; again, the Polonceau-style roof structure is reflected on the floor and in the water of the former service pits which are recycled as baths.

So revealing a secret is the theme underpinning the transformation. The enclave with its monumental spaces and new duty as bath house is revealed one step at a time by five kinds of intervention: an increase in concealment, intrigue, infiltration, enclosure and revelation.

The damaged components in the heart of the industrial monument have been replaced by two types of insertion that stand out by being spatial reversals of the enveloping monument. These enclaves-within-an-enclave are patios and prisms. The patios consist of outdoor gardens and an open-air pool and can be reached on the ground floor from the 'thermal' and 'Olympic' parts of the complex. The vertically oriented light-refracting prisms are placed 3 metres from the ground at the entrances and reception area and enfold functions where men and women are kept separate. These volumes, which contain the changing rooms and hammams, are primarily intended for the large group of Islamic inhabitants of the western part of Amsterdam. This group of course has its own requirements for the ritual of bathing. The prism enclaves leave the ground floor free for the mixed circulation of men and women. The process of concealment, intrigue, infiltration, enclosure and revelation is repeated here in the relationship between prism enclave and bathing enclave. The prism enclaves are concealed yet at the same time so resolutely present as to be intriguing to the women and men in the bathing enclave. Once led into and enclosed in the innermost recesses of the hammams, Islamic bathers gain 'insight' into the 'Western' thermal part of the complex. In this way, the Islamic segment of the local population will become curious about Western bathing culture from inside its enclave-within-an-enclave.

Place of education: TU Delft
Specialization: architecture
Tutors: Paul Meurs, Ferruccio Colautti