Dutch architect Powerhouse Company has revealed its design for a modular timber, 82-unit social housing project in Rotterdam that it says is demountable.
The 12-storey, 40m-high Valckensteyn housing block will be built in Pendrecht, a southern suburb of Rotterdam built during the city’s post-war reconstruction, and now suffering from social deprivation.
The largest timber building of its kind in the Netherlands, it will occupy the site of an earlier social housing project of the same name.
Stefan Prins, the lead architect, said the aim of the design was to “showcase the harmony of concrete stability and wooden innovation, where sustainability meets affordability”.
About 85% of the building will be taken up by the timber elements, stiffened by a concrete elevator core.
The timber structure will be light enough to use the old foundations, thereby cutting out a whole package of works.
Factory-fabricated modules
The building itself will be built up from a range of factory-fabricated cross-laminated-timber modules laid on a plinth clad in travertine, a sedimentary rock.
These are assembled without the use of glue, meaning the building can be demounted rather than demolished at the end of its life.
The lower storeys have floor-to-ceiling windows, and the flats on the western facade have wide balconies.
The flower gardens and arboretum were designed by Rotterdam firm LAP Landscape & Urban Design with biodiversity in mind.
The client for the project is the Woonstad Rotterdam Housing Corporation. Dutch engineer IOB handles the structural and MEP elements, and was also the QS.
The cost of the project has not been revealed.
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