Three contextual interventions in Transvaal, The Hague
The Hague market (Haagse Markt), the industrial estate on Monstersestraat and a local park together present a barrier in the city 50 metres wide and one and a half kilometres long. This final-year project sees me tackling the urban design brief of the Strip as a city barrier using a trio of interventions. These allow passage through the Strip and at the same time mark it as a part of the city in its own right. The three interventions - a pause-place, seven central reservation homes and a pivot theatre - supplement the existing programme of market, park and industrial estate plus a number of facilities needed nearby including a library and a children's zoo.

The pause-place is a place of repose for people at the market as well as a place to wait for the tram. Standing on the line where the street patterns of the flanking areas converge, the pause-place consists of a long wooden bench enveloped by a zigzag structure of Corten steel gates. It is set square to the tram line, so that the view from the bench runs parallel to the tracks making it easy to see the tram coming. The gates loosely divide the bench into smaller sections. This pause-place not only marks the Strip as a place-between in the city, it is also somewhere to sit and wait away from the city's humdrum flow.

The seven central reservation homes stand on the edge of the local park. This intervention potentially is the first in a series that can turn the diffuse local park into one more compact and enclosed. Passage through the Strip is expressed on the ground plane. A brick grid of perforated hatches in front of the building gives a sense of protective shelter inside the dwellings and seeks to strike a balance between ubiquitous city and private home. The grid adopts the height of the building and stands one and a half metres in front of the dwellings. This tall narrow space containing the access gallery is like a crack in the wall. The dwellings themselves consist of two L-shapes in mirror image. You enter through the 'cracks' between these forms and the party walls and circle in an unbroken route up through the dwelling. Daylight reflected dramatically across the floor downstairs, along the upper storey walls and the topmost ceiling, accompanies the occupant through this no-threshold home that only ends at the last visible line, the city's horizon.

The pivot theatre sits hinge-like in the long blind wall of Uitenhage industrial estate, providing a short cut between the two city areas. These areas meet on the outer side of the theatre by way of a public route wrapped round the building that allows passers-by a view of day-to-day activities in the theatre workshop. The theatre itself consists of a cone tucked into a cube. Lending its shape to the auditorium, the cone resembles an upside-down arena and leans forward so that spectators in the rings have a good downward view of the action on-stage. The ambience is sultry and intense. On the upper floor is the panorama café looking out over the two city areas. The pivot theatre is a dream world in the Strip where you can linger for a while, away from workaday reality.

With these three interventions, the Strip's presence is justified and the city can flow freely again.

Place of education: TU Eindhoven | Specialization: architecture | Tutors: Jos Bosman, Jacob Voorthuis, Michiel Dehaene