The construction of Tripolis Park, which renovates and transforms one of the last projects completed by the celebrated Dutch modernist architect Aldo van Eyck, is complete. On behalf of developer Flow, MVRDV restored two of the three listed heritage buildings in line with Van Eyck’s original designs and added a 12-storey “landscraper” along the edge of the site to shelter the complex (which includes Van Eyck’s Amsterdam Orphanage next door) from noise and dust generated by the adjacent A10 highway. The new building is careful in its relationship with the heritage buildings, keeping a respectful distance so that an exciting in-between space emerges where the two meet, with bridges crossing overhead to connect old and new.

MVRDV’s design makes the next step in this history. The original Tripolis did not prove commercially successful, standing empty for years. Meanwhile an upcoming expansion of the adjacent A10 highway, which includes a new on-ramp right alongside the Tripolis site, threatened to bring increased noise and pollution. Like the orphanage in the 1980s, the Tripolis buildings, in turn, needed an intervention to ensure their future. Following archival research and close collaboration with Van Eyck’s heirs, MVRDV’s design has restored the buildings’ façades not to their original state, but one step better: to Van Eyck’s initial designs. For example, the façades are now fully clad in wood, unlike the cheaper wood and granite combination requested by the Tripolis developer in the 1990s. The building’s multi-coloured window frames are also retained.

图片 Image © Ossip van Duivenbode 

图片 Image © Ossip van Duivenbode 

The roofs are upgraded with greenery and pavilions that enable interaction between all users of the complex and which can be used for events. 

Inside, the renovation keeps characteristic elements such as the staircases and the natural stone floors, but it also adapts the buildings to bring them in line with modern standards, where offices are increasingly seen as spaces for meeting and collaborating. Dividing walls have been removed, so that the building is less compartmentalised, while various interventions make the building more sustainable. The roofs are now used more intensively, with greenery and pavilions that enable interaction between all users of the complex and which can be used for events. Solar panels are also introduced, helping the development achieve BREEAM Outstanding sustainability certification.

图片 Image © Ossip van Duivenbode 

图片 Image © Ossip van Duivenbode 

新增建筑南侧的立面采用平铺直叙的简约风格（上），而北立面因顺延现有建筑的起伏屋顶，形成“凹陷”式的构造，在新旧建筑中制造出有趣的“镶嵌”空间（下）

The new building has a rigid, business-like appearance on the south facade (image above), while the north facade is “dented” by the presence of the existing buildings, creating an exciting space in the offset between the two elements (image below)

北侧立面

north elevation

“当历史建筑和旧建筑不再适用时，拆除总是最简单的选择，尤其是当它位于高层建筑占主导地位的商业区时，”MVRDV 创始合伙人 Winy Maas 说道。“Tripolis 办公园的改造提供了一种保护历史建筑的特别方法，同时满足了当下市场对办公建筑和空间的需求。它结合了新的密度，延续了阿姆斯特丹南区的发展进程；它也并没有单纯复制Van Eyck的初衷，而是创造了新的需求和新的时间层次。它强调了‘中间的空间’，正如我还是学生时Aldo 告诉我的，‘中间的空间’正是建筑之美的主要起源之一。”

“Demolition of heritage is always the easy option, especially if it is located in a business district dominated by high-rise buildings,” says MVRDV founding partner Winy Maas. “Tripolis Park offers an approach to protecting heritage that at the same time meets people’s expectations for an office today. It combines this with new densification, a continuation of the development at Amsterdam Zuidas, that doesn’t copy Van Eyck’s intention, but creates a new one, like a new layer in time. And it celebrates the in-between which, as Aldo explained to me when I was a student, is one of the main sources of beauty in architecture.”

图片 Image © Ossip van Duivenbode 

图片 Image © Ossip van Duivenbode 

Tripolis 办公园完成改造之后，Van Eyck的经典作品又重新回到了办公地产市场，吸引了Uber和荷兰知名律师事务所 De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek 等头部企业入驻。未来几年，原 Tripolis 办公楼的第三栋建筑将继续进行修复，场地的绿化也将持续进行，人们可以通过步行或骑自行车从这里到达附近的地铁站和阿姆斯特丹商务区的其他目的地，从而形成一个公园式的办公园区，Aldo van Eyck 在1960 年和 1994 年完成的这两座建筑经典也得到了应有的庇护。

With Tripolis Park, Van Eyck’s monument is re-established within the current office rental market, evident in the fact that it has attracted two prestige tenants in Uber and law firm De Brauw Blackstone Westbroek. In the coming years, work will continue on the third of the original Tripolis buildings. The greening of the site, which will be easily accessible via walking and cycling paths from the other parts of the Zuidas and the nearby metro station, will also continue, forming a park-like campus in which Aldo van Eyck’s buildings – from 1960 and 1994 alike – are sheltered and preserved.

图片 Image © Ossip van Duivenbode