
There’s nothing more exciting for an architect than to shape the form of his own city with a new building. And that’s what Rem Koolhaas is about to do in Rotterdam with a large scale mixed use building. Also, a project developed for The Hague, also in the Netherlands, will start construction as of next year. Site visits will be closer to the central OMA headquarters this time.
First, we’ve got a 120.000m2 (30.000m2 for retail, 70.000m2 for office, residential, culture and leisure) mixed use building in the Rotterdam’s shopping district, the Coolsingel. This district is actually the true centre of Rotterdam, where the most important streets in Rotterdam merge (Coolsingel, Lijbaan, Binnenweg and Beurstraverse).
This design doesn’t compete for height, but aims to change the identity of the city centre by inserting the pure form of a cube into existing buildings. Voids within the cube introduce configurations that bring daylight into the cube whilst providing views to the surroundings.
