Re-awakening the senses
Amplifying sensory experience in the local context of Winsum
J.M. Lueb (TU Delft - Architecture and the Built Environment)
H.J. Bultstra – Mentor (TU Delft - Architecture and the Built Environment)
A.M.F. van Dam – Mentor (TU Delft - Architecture and the Built Environment)
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Abstract
This Studio departs from the Nij Begun agenda, a 30-year plan recently implemented by the Dutch Government to build a better future for the regions of Groningen and North Drenthe. Nij Begun targets areas that have been affected for decades by practices of gas extraction and, therefore, also by several earthquakes, causing serious damages to buildings as well as economical and mental damage to its inhabitants. Groningen differs from neighbouring provinces such as Friesland, Drenthe, and the Wadden region, where identities and leisure infrastructure are more established and the destination more clearly defined.
In regions where sustainable tourism is increasingly used as a strategy for economic and social regeneration, public architecture plays an important role in shaping how architecture affects everyday life and social cohesion. Within the Nij Begun, the broader regional ambition, small villages such as Winsum provide an opportunity to explore how tourism and public architecture can be brought together in a meaningful way.
Through a research-by-design approach, this project explores how a public building can transform movement into moments of pause by structuring spatial sequences through senses, landscape, and program. The design proposes a hybrid public building that integrates tourism-related functions with everyday local use, including a public roof garden as a key example of this shared programme. By framing views of the horizon, water, and changing daylight conditions, the building encourages visitors and residents to experience the rhythms of the northern Dutch landscape and to slow down within everyday movement. This experience is further strengthened by the rhythm of the structural trusses, which guide movement through the building, the sound of rainwater that makes changing weather conditions more present, and the public quay that draws people towards the water and its activities.