BRAINVILLE is a creative densification strategy for Brainpark I – a business park in Rotterdam. It creates a multifuncional environment that unlocks productive urban life and establishes an engaged, sustainable local community. The strategy takes from existing local urban block typology, transforming it from monolithic volume into a permeable and lively neighborhood. Urban arrangement appears ‘vernacular’ because of its irregular layout, differing heights of architectural volumes and variety of public, semi-public and semi-private spaces. That environment creates a productive community based on communal life and circular economy rules.
BRAINVILLE name is inspired by its settlement-like arrangement that creates human-scale urban tissue of strong narratives and community encouraging features. The new urban block emphasizes sustainable values by rediscovering, reusing and recycling existing resources. A park zone is densified within its existing shape with public functions and intensified by remodeling existing parking lots into permeable biotope zones.
BRAINVILLE does not demolish any of the existing office buildings, but rather develops their functional layouts by adding satellite volumes, creating functional neighborhoods / theme clusters. The strategy also reuses existing road, changing its status into a car-free smart mobility route: an urban boulevard promoting effective, yet sustainable means of transportation.
View Original