Music Box – Den Haag

Abstract

Spaces for music does often have to move out to fringe areas of the cities while the city centres are devoted to retail and office buildings. However, due to the financial crisis and shifting demands from coorporations, there are around 8,5 million m2 of vacant office space in the Netherlands today.
Office buildings in city centres are potential candidates for new types of culture centres / creative business hubs and by utilizing these buildings, new life can be brought to the street and different forms of culture practises can reach more people.
Since 2013, Many culture institutions in the Netherlands have been affected by dramatic cuts in the countries budget for culture. The diminished funding hasorganisational changes and downsizing. Many voices have been raised that the governments acting is a serious threat to the diversity and quality of music, dance and art.
In 2013, the Dutch government, led by Mark Rutte cut the funding for culture by ca 25 %. Many culture institutions in the Netherlands have been affected by these dramatic cuts with organisational changes and downsizing. While the Rutte government is putting pressure on the culture sector to be increasingly self-reliant in terms of financing, the right wing populist Geert Wilders (who is currently in the lead for the coming election) wants to completely stop all governmental funding towards culture. The project is an exploration of how to create a consolidating building for different music organisations which have experienced problems due to a shifting political agenda towards culture. A second aspect of the project is how to maintain a diverse music environment in the centre of Den Haag for the public as well as for musicians. Because of economic issues, spaces for music does often have to move out to fringe areas of the cities while the city centres are devoted to retail and office buildings. Currently, however, there are around 8,5 million m2 of vacant office space in the Netherlands. By utilizing one of these buildings close to the central station of Den Haag, new life can be brought to the street and more versatile music climate can be maintained.