Originating from a fascination with what nature can bring, this project aims to break the boundary between man and nature in the urban environment. In this design, an existing concrete building in Rotterdam is not demolished, but cracked open and transformed into a living project for learning and housing. It shows how nature, human and architecture can merge.
Central in this project is the office building Blakeburg, designed in 1977 by Jan Hoogstad, which is being redeveloped into a Montessori school, housing for the elderly and public space. The building transforms from a closed, monofunctional volume to an open and changeable biotope in which learning, living and ecology reinforce each other.
The architectural interventions, such as opening up the façade, integrating a landscape staircase, and deploying natural ventilation through existing towers, emerged from a research process. Through literature review, case study visits, participation workshops with children, and the creation of a comic book, seven design principles were formulated: community, reciprocal relationship, natural elements, sustainability, flexibility, participation and scalability.
In this project, nature is not added as aesthetic greenery but is the foundation of the whole design. It is a plea for architecture as a living organism, in which the boundaries between city and nature, old and new, young and old, slowly blur, and space is created for a changing future.