diagoon housing by herman hertzberger

this is the diagoon housing project by herman hertzberger, built in delft in 1971. one of my peers at MIT studied it as a precedent in a studio last spring. i was looking up hertzberger's work in the netherlands and discovered that this project, a small single building for 8 or so families, is very close to me. it is tucked into a dense pack of suburban developments southwest of the center, right near the delft zuid train station off the kruithuisweg. you approach this through a maze of houses with cars in front, gardens in various states of disarray, cats on the prowl, and two kids climbing trees on a sunday afternoon that is cold enough to bite your ears when you ride quickly through it without a hat. the building faces west towards a square of land long overgrown with trees but still with paths cut through. dutch ideas of gardens are always messy and overgrown, a bit ragged as if you have been on vacation for months. i was late for something so i only had a chance to observe quickly and then continue. it always makes me nervous to start architecturally undressing a building with people inside looking out at me. i could only take one picture without feeling awkward because somebody in a white shirt was in the second-floor kitchen. hertzberger built some cool stuff with plain CMUs and modernist detailing. the cool thing about this project was its supposed interior flexibility and split-level floor stacking. it seemed nice from the outside, like a little commune set among the banality of suburbia. really, though, you couldn't tell it was much different from the surrounding blocks except that this one looked particularly austere and plain. the flickr photos of this place make it seem very clean cut and maintained, whereas in my picture it sits beyond a bulging hedge and empty tree. i almost like this more, as an image of a work that is lived in, inhabited, and has its own life. its domestic scale and simplicity give it a humble reading i admire, as if to say "i can't change much about the rest of the built environment, but i can provide a worthwhile place to make a home."

i had a discussion recently with another architecture student at the halloween party at the nieuwelaan house, the one where i was dressed as the great state of texas and encouraged people to write their stereotypes of the state on its foiled shape that hung over my shoulders. he is fed up with starchitecture and the lack of concern for details or at least architecture as something other than image or brand. he asked me who my favorite firms were in america who were unknown here but doing solid, well-designed, respectable work. i could only name a handful, embarrassingly (i did mention the name lake/flato because i like them a lot). but it made me think about how much work there is out there for architects and how even the smallest projects can be so satisfying. projects that have clean lines and are enjoyable places to live are beautiful. this is why dwell magazine does so well.

maybe: fuck the birds nest and zaha hadid and santiago calatrava and design competitions. maybe what we need instead of legions of grad students with thick glasses getting off to the rem koolhaas el croquis are people who want to move to a small town somewhere and start building solid, inspiring, cheap buildings. the chances to work at that huge scale and with that piercing urban/global vision are so minimal and the situations so saturated with compromise and legality. even if i end up being an architect i will never work like that. thought i would be open to working for somebody who works like that. in the end, there is probably more value in sitting in your hometown and designing schools, fire stations, churches, and homes. i worked for a company that did just this and has had a great impact on denton over the last 30 years. of course this takes a narrow view of what architecture can be (just buildings) but it is an inviting, human-scale version of an architectural career. so lets all light a candle for the architects who get no recognition in online rags like archdaily for putting in long hours on local projects that really change lives. god bless samuel mockbee and architects for humanity. amen.

ok, now i'm going to sleep. i have work to do tomorrow and a short presentation with winy maas present about a why factory workshop i'm participating in. goodnight.

i trekked to utrecht

on sunday i went to utrecht. it is in the middle of the country closer to amsterdam. i went to walk around the downtown area and to hike out to the university of utrecht that has some pretty awesome buildings by some SUPERDUTCH firms (OMA, wiel arets, neutelings riedijk, others).

it was a cloudy day and i enjoyed the city center of utrecht. lots of people were out on sunday afternoon shopping and sitting in cafes. it feels medieval and almost italian. the church tower is visible from everywhere and the cathedral was quite impressive even though half of it was destroyed some time ago so it exists as half a sanctuary and then a tower. it feels fortified because the canals are set a whole story lower than the street (whereas in delft they are on the same level), so you have another walkway down along the water and catacomb-like spaces for storage or business. lots of restaurants set up in these subterranean spaces and put tables out along the water which at night seemed like a beautiful place to eat. the city definitely seemed magical at night. in one block i passed a music venue that hosted a diverse set of acts from sun o))) to maceo parker and marcus miller, art galleries, a good jazz record shop (i could see a vinyl copy of "water babies" on the shelf) that looked like it also had a hair salon in the back (very trendy), a good-looking greek restaurant, and a comic book store.

outside the main island area it gets more normal but still nice. it was a long walk out to the university but enjoyable as there was a lot to look at. along one of the main routes out of downtown i ate at daily wok, the euro-version of wagamama for some cheap noodles. as you continue out of town, the housing gets more standardized but still with big trees and restaurants in old train stations. i made a detour to see a famous house that wasn't very impressive in person and then kept walking.

once you get close to the beltway, you get into campus land with student housing in squat 2-story brick apartments, a big soccer stadium, and a nice campus for the utrecht college. there is a nice dormitory there that acts as a sound wall between an adjacent highway and the rest of campus. it is a long thin building where each student room gets a floor-to-ceiling window inside their brick bay unit. it is nice because it is sculpted to be a wall, with brick serifs coming off each end of the building, tapering to a point but still with windows as if the building isn't a new building but inhabiting a shell of a cathedral or fortress (there is an old fortress on the campus so maybe it is a reference to that).

i finally got to the university of utrecht only as the really interesting library by wiel arets closed at 6. the place was deserted and no buildings were open. i looked around as the sun was getting low, checking out some of the main buildings i didn't recognize and then rem's educatorium and a research building with snakes in the facade. the dorms were quite varied, from a very cosmopolitan high rise to a very eastern-bloc building made of prefab pods once painted and now weathered. it was interesting though as the campus was on farmland so you have these large projects and then across the bike path, the odor of cows and rabbits hopping down into creekbeds. i took a bus back to the main train station to start over and walk the downtown area (all the way south to the museum this time) again as the sun set.

like i said, the city is much more luxurious at night when people sit outside to eat and the lights reflect off the canals. it is quite a romantic scene. on one dock i passed a thai restaurant next to a north indian restaurant next to an italian pizzeria with tables along the water. i was very impressed with utrecht.










i really liked this bench.


my favorite canal/street, oudegracht.




the rietveld schroderhuis (1924). not that impressive in person. you can see all of the layers of paint. like other early 20th century experiments in modern construction, it seems flimsy. as an object or a set of planes in space it seems interesting but i don't know about as a home. i didn't see the interior though so maybe that is nice. i kept walking.


finally on campus at the university of utrecht.




the wiel arets library (2004) i had seen in some books. the paneled facade seemed pretty cool and the interior, from what i had seen, looked nice though i didn't get to go in because it closed. it takes this one pattern, shown below, and uses it both for an impression in the cladding and on the glass, maybe as a strategy to keep direct light down on all the precious books inside. very herzog & de meuron but it does the job.




also had this pool bowl entrance to a restaurant on campus. on top of the restaurant was a basketball court.



the educatorium by rem/OMA (1997). the diagram of this building is really evident. it is another ramp building and seems pretty successful. it would've been nice to see the interior.


a smaller funky building whose diagram is also evident, directly across the street from the educatorium. it is by UNstudio (ben van berkel), sort of a proto diller & scofidio type thing. i don't know. i don't know what happens inside either. it has some pretty nice circulation though.


building by neutelings riedijk (1997). i have trouble pronouncing that firm's name. i have been saying it out loud for the past 23 seconds. it has sprayed concrete as a facade with some odd tremors-esque worms crawling around. i don't know what happens inside, it is probably a lab building.


this building (the tower) is too sexy to be a student dorm. it should be relocated to miami.


again, i have no idea what is going on here. i think somebody was inspired by a shipyard. this is a dorm. i saw people in the windows cooking though i have no idea what goes on in those beams that go across. too industrial.


modular student housing. sort of crappy and weird. they are spined together and the walkways are covered but outdoors. heating bills must be really high.


ok. now you're tired and you're just playing with glass, jack. get on that bus and get back downtown before the sun sets completely.


good, i made it back downtown.


then i walked around for a bit and looked at all of the restaurants i couldn't eat in because i am poor. plus it is no fun to eat by yourself at expensive restaurants because there is no experience or environment or umwelt or milieu without (a) friend(s) to partake with. luxurious settings like that are meant to be enjoyed and that is hard to do by yourself, especially for me because i immediately devour my food without poise and am done too quickly to harvest pleasure from the experience. plus i didn't have a book and i didn't feel like drawing. oh, and i am poor. there are some good-looking restaurants though and a couple funky bars. i walked by one with a lot of rockers hanging out and a band that sounded like dinosaur jr. warming up.


the netherlands is the venice of europe.

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in other news, i finally named my laptop that i bought over a month ago. her name is worknesh mega. she is named after a lion i met in ethiopia because both animals are golden and powerful. at first i didn't really like the windows set-up but i optimized some things and now it is comfortable.

also: i found the veggie products at the supermarket. they are kept in the back in between two types of carcass. why would they be there? why would vegetarians even want to venture among the graveyard that is the meat section? regardless, i had veggie burgers yesterday and am planning to cook some tempeh this weekend too.

also: i went to a jam session last night for the school jazz association at a bar and played well on electric bass. the bar was tiny and filled with students. people there were pretty amateur but it was fun to shred a bit. they play the same tired stuff people in america play. people liked how i soloed though, even calling out for a bass solo, getting quieter, and then clapping. i laid down one jerry jemmott line from king curtis's "memphis soul stew" and everybody was feelin' all right. i met some people to play with, even playing this afternoon on a double bass at the cultural center for a while. we'll see how this goes.

school is OK. you can only check out 10 books at a time from the library and even when you do, people stare at you funny like you have a problem or are actively sprouting a second head from your original one. it is weird. the faculty closed at 7 pm today so i had to go home then. i went to a really good lecture this morning by philosopher patrick healy. he is teaching a class about the philosophy of image and its relation to architecture. he gave a mesmerizing talk about schinkel and berlin and the origin of museums as cultural spaces. he talked like a preacher. i looked at the clock a lot but it was honestly to wish that it was moving slower.

rotterdam

on sunday i went to rotterdam. rotterdam is holland's second city, after amsterdam. it is set on a wide river and used to be the world's most active port for shipping containers (it was surpassed in 2004 by shanghai). during world war II the germans tried to invade the netherlands but were unable so they bombed the shit out of rotterdam, destroying most of the downtown. most of the buildings now are mid-century high-rises ranging from mildly interesting to absolutely ugly (in general i am not an admirer of the skyscraper).

i took the train there for the afternoon and early evening; the journey from delft to rotterdam probably takes about the same amount of time as the voyage from lechmere to park station in boston. i walked around and saw mostly architectural sites, managing to walk for a long time from the western cultural areas all the way over to blaak and back again to the main train station, a building that is being rebuilt and so that area is a mess. i got really hungry but managed to find some food (street vietnamese food [there will be a post about this stuff soon], bagel sandwich, pizza quattro formaggi). i also started to get harassed by some bum in dutch about loaning him some rolling papers, but when he saw the non-dutch-speaking look in my eye he immediately said "oh fuck, you speak english, hey man, can you help me out..." it is nice that bums can annoy you in two languages here. also walked by the american apparel rotterdam; it looks the same. i also saw a thai restaurant near blaak that looked really good. i'll probably eat there on a subsequent trip to rotterdam.

here are some pics for summary. i might put more on flickr or facebook if i have time. but probably not.

(update: i surprised myself and splurged for a pro account on flickr. the link is in the column to your right, my left [as i stare out at you from within the screen]. ok, then. goedenacht.)






cafe de unie, an important de stijl work by dutch architect j.j.p. oud (1925). actually, the internet tells me that the original building was destroyed by the germans and this is a recreation in a location different than the original.


street scene with trolley apparatus


NAI, nederlands architectuurinstituut, an organization that hosts exhibits and events. they are hosting a biennale this fall that should have some pretty interesting stuff. the building is kind of a geometric mess (and they use astroturf instead of real grass), but the gallery space i was able to see looked spare enough to like. the library is in that main volume with columns pushed outside the building but it wasn't open on sundays.


interior of huis sonneveld (1933). early dutch functionalist house for a factory owner that actually survived the WWII bombing. well-chosen colors and tons of interesting features. it is worthwhile to compare this to the gropius house built in the same time period (1937) for technological and social reasons: both had intercoms, modern kitchen equipment, and steel tubular furniture but still had space for service people to wait on the family that was really old world.


bedroom for teenage daughter including her own phone and listening station. if the record player or radio in the living room downstairs was on, she could listen in bed. this room is done in blue; the other daughter's room is in yellow. nice.


kunsthal by rem koolhaas (OMA) and cecil balmond (ARUP) in museumpark (1993). medium-sized space for exhibitions as the organization has no permanent collection. satisfying post-modern mix of expensive materials (travertine) and cheap ones (plywood, corrugated plastic). i realized that this is the first rem building i have seen in person, save for the construction on the dallas theatre center. a sort-of generic ramp-based building whose rampness seems like a good move to span the 10-meter level change between park level and street level.


kunsthal auditorium. i liked the kitsch value of this hall, with flimsy chairs and plywood finishing. the angled columns are nice too. cecil has a chapter on this building in his book "informal," but i don't need to hear any of his intellectual meditations because they are fluff.


there was a small part of the gallery that had this grating as the floor. totally awkward as i could not even look at the art and had to focus on controlling my paranoia that the floor would fold and snap and i'd fall 25 feet to the ground. thanks rem.








found piet blom's overblaak cube development (1978-1984) and went into one of the units that is now a museum.


tons of wasted and awkward space. also generally dark because windows at this level were angled down. the unit was also weirdly decorated, with a collection of model designer chairs, LOTR figurines, and a cactus collection on the upper sunroom. totally unpractical.


this was probably built with some vague commune-inspired urban social dream that sought to create both private and public places in the development. the public spaces underneath the cubes are still used as storefronts, but the feeling is again awkward with the faces of the homes and windows looking almost directly down at you, focusing any views out the lower windows directly onto the plaza users. there also isn't much light on the patio spaces so it seems dark, almost literally shady. residents refer to the development as "blaakse bos" or "blaak forest." not that impressed.


another plaza with a concert hall where i had dinner before the short train ride home. i didn't have dinner in the concert hall, i sat outside at an italian restaurant as the sun died. the sun always sets sooner in a big city because of the tall buildings.

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upon returning to delft in the dying light i heard the blues and followed my ears to koornmarkt straat where i find a one-man band pumping out the greatest hits of american music. he plays blues, he plays "like a rolling stone," he raps in english to a 50 cent hit (one i can't remember) before letting his rhythm tracks take over and playing some latin music. it is sunday night and there are some possibly inebriated dutch people shaking with no abandon to this guy's electro backing. somebody i met at jean-paul's going away party (the dude from botswana) recognizes me and gives me a free beer (brand, not the best kind of beer out there but hey, it is free). then, the pace slows, and the singer dude breaks into a version of "purple rain." people aren't sure how to dance to this, but it doesn't matter because the dude is feeding us a ridiculously shredding guitar solo over his backing. after that the 50 cent beat comes back on and some young breakers try their moves and hustle the crowd for 50 eurocent pieces. in this world you can't really leave america anymore. it has infected every place.