In this first phase of the CONTEXT assignment, we are to make an architectone based on diagrams of the Villa VPRO (1997) - a building we became familiar with on our study trip to the Netherlands in October 2015. It relates to the assignment ahead by being home to one of the oldest Dutch broadcasting companies, VPRO. Many different branches of VPRO are fitted into the villa, which offers the framework for varying work situations and flexibility with its open plan layout and lively circulation routes. Our fascination lays in the voids, which precisely slice into the otherwise static typology and bring daylight to the innermost corners of the building. The voids also function as space organizers and become the connecting points through different levels.
As this semester is entitled ‘Transformation’ we have been assigned the site of the KFK storage building (1926) on Aarhus harbor front. For many years the building functioned as storage space for feedstuffs, which is the reason for its characteristic over-dimensioned columns that are placed in a grid in the building giving an open plan spin.
Our approach to the architectone then became the voids and how they can work as organizational volumes and divide the spaces in an open plan. By adding mass to the voids, the negative space becomes positive and is a three-dimensional volume. Next step will be to abstract even further from the building. We hope to do this by adding the principle of circulation that unfolds in a loop from the bottom to the top of the building – this will perhaps enable us to expand beyond the very horizontal oriented form of Villa VPRO and make a lighter and livelier expression.
