Social community centre Huis van Droo (lit.House of Droo) is located in the heart of the master plan for Droo-South area in Duiven (The Netherlands) that envisions the renewal of this entire neighbourhood. JDWA, the design team of Huis van Droo, is also responsible for the preparation of this master plan, as well as the design of the communal garden – ‘Tuin van Droo’ – surrounding Huis van Droo and the connection to the adjacent nursing home. Incorporating these different scales in the design process, from small to large, made it possible to improve the quality of architecture and the public space AND to ensure an optimal integration of sustainability measures for the entire project.
Interactive process – From the beginning of the draft master plan we have been extensively working together with the current residents of the neighbourhood, the new users (HMOs) and the future users of Huis van Droo. In interactive sessions, we outlined the layout for the renewal of Droo-Zuid. This method was continued well into the building design phase of Huis van Droo as well as for the design of the Tuin van Droo.
Shared use and dual use – To realise the versatile programme (housing, care housing, primary care, sports, childcare, community facilities) within the confines of the renewal statement, there was a real need to efficiently target and assign the available space. It was necessary to share both indoor and outdoor spaces. This way the plan could retain sufficient light and air and only then would the public space really remain available to play, meet and relax.
Droo-Zuid: sustainable neighbourhood – The three architects responsible for the architecture in Droo-Zuid have continually tuned their design, programme and building typology paying full attention to sustainability in all its aspects and scales. As for sustainability measures for Huis van Droo; JDWA in collaboration with various consultants made an extra effort. The building envelope (steel & timber frame construction) and technical measures (cold-heat storage, solar collectors, heat pumps, etc.) are perfectly matched. Due to our involvement with the master plan it was possible to improve the building development with technical systems that we could share with the other new buildings. Thus the whole system of cold – heat storage is shared with the adjacent nursing home, increasing the efficiency of the systems’ usage greatly.
source: jdwa.nl
