Powerhouse Company: The Latest Architecture and News

Powerhouse Company, together with Studio Donna van Milligen Bielke & Ard de Vries Architecten, Team V Architecture, Joppe Kusters, and DELVA Landscape Architecture | Urbanism, has won the competition to design a creative urban district in Havenstraat, a well-known fringe area in Amsterdam. Set in a location defined by disused industrial remnants, historic trams, and informal greenery, the area shows its potential in offering space for experimentation, opening itself to local businesses, creatives, and makers to refine its character.

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Powerhouse Company has just revealed its designs for “The Harmony” in the Amsterdam Zuidas area. Featuring two towers, The Canyon and The Coast, the project aims to blend office spaces, commercial areas, and affordable housing. “The Harmony” establishes a new link between the Zuidas district and the upcoming residential zone of Ravel.

Designed by Powerhouse Company, the BaanTower has started construction in the remodeled Baan Quarter neighborhood of Rotterdam. The residential tower strives to promote a sustainable architecture based on the well-being of its residents. Upon completion, the high-rise will house 427 apartments available for rent. Seven years after the original draft, the project has recently received its building permit, and is expected to be completed by 2026.

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The Norwegian studio of Powerhouse, in collaboration with KIMA arkitektur, has won a design competition for the transformation and extension of one of the historical buildings located in the center of Landbrukskvartalet. Known as the Agricultural Quarter, a former farming and industrial site in central Oslo, the area is now scheduled to go through an urban revitalization process to be transformed into an active neighborhood based on the design philosophy of ‘new meets old’.

Powerhouse Company, in collaboration with landscape architecture office DELVA, has unveiled the design for a new visitor center for the Koekamp, which will play an essential role as a gateway to the new Hollandse Duinen national park. This intervention will open part of Koekamp, a green expanse near The Hague’s Central Station, to the public. The visitor center, commissioned by the Dutch forestry commission, is expected to be completed in 2024.

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The City of Rotterdam has selected Powerhouse Company, Atelier Oslo, Lundhagem to renew and extend the city’s Central Library, a landmark building from the early 1980s designed by Van den Broek & Bakema. The new design adopts the concept of radical reuse in order to transform a 1980s building into a contemporary library, well-adapted to the necessities of modern users. The team combines the expertise of Powerhouse Company, Atelier Oslo, and Lundhagem, the latter two offices being awarded in 2021 with the Public Library of the Year Award for their design of Oslo!s Deichman library. Construction is expected to begin in 2025 and be completed by the end of 2028, the year marking the building!s 45th anniversary.

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Powerhouse Company has revealed a new design for THIS., a new mixed-use development in Amsterdam’s North District. Overlooking the waterfront of the IJ river, the complex offers the necessary amenities for both working and living in an area close to the city center. The ensemble includes a new office building, two waterfront private sector residential buildings, and two social housing blocks containing a total of 2017 homes. A Hidden Garden, designed by Delva Landscape Architecture and Urbanism, connects the residential and office buildings, creating a space for leisure and social activities.

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Powerhouse Company has revealed the design of the new IBM Headquarters in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The architects drew inspiration from the client’s ethos to create a building that functions as a vertical city, with a large atrium conceived as the central social space and multi-tenant offices as neighborhood units. The 35,000 square meter building will house startups and scaleups in addition to the various amenities like fitness areas, restaurants, and lecture halls.

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Powerhouse Company revealed its design for the new Tilburg University Lecture Hall, which upon completion, will be the Netherlands’ first academic building made of cross-laminated timber. Set within a wooded landscape, the lecture hall is a nod to the 1960s grade-listed Modernist architecture of the campus, echoing its monastic atmosphere through the rhythm of the windows and the limestone façades.

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The Çanakkale Antenna Tower designed by IND [Inter.National.Design] and Powerhouse Company is nearing completion. Located on a forested hill in the aforementioned city, the weathering steel structure envelops the landscape before growing into a 100-meter tall tower that offers a panoramic view of the historic Turkish city. The single design gesture simultaneously crafts an intimate experience of nature through the creation of an inner garden, immersing visitors into the surrounding forest while creating a new visual identity for the city.

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Powerhouse Company has won the competition to transform the Alo-location and neighborhood in Groningen, a city in the Netherlands. They teamed up with Houben/Van Mierlo, Vector-i and landscape architect DELVA to create the proposal. Dubbed HOLT, the project was developed with MWPO, Nijestee and Nijhuis Bouw. The plan for a new green and healthy neighborhood looks to the future of healthy living in the city.

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A new masterplan and building scheme has been designed for the Codrico Factory and Rijnhaven in Rotterdam. With the overall plan created by Powerhouse Company in collaboration with developer RED Company, the proposal includes a series of buildings by Mecanoo, SHoP Architects, Office Winhov and Crimson Architectural Historians. Called the "Codrico Terrain", the project aims to celebrate local industrial heritage and embrace change for the future.

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Powerhouse Company has revealed a new design for Floating Office Rotterdam (FOR), the headquarters of the Global Center on Adaptation (GCA). As the team states, construction will start this spring, and the all-timber project will be both energy-neutral and self-sufficient. The GCA will be housed in the Rijnhaven in Rotterdam for a period of 5 to 10 years.

Construction has begun on the Loop of Wisdom in Chengdu, China, designed by Powerhouse Company. The red, walkable, curvy roof follows the landscape and twists through a lush, vivid park, promoting themes of health and beauty. The scheme will house the Exhibition and Reception Centers for the surrounding Unis Chip City masterplan, founded on the principles of people, nature, and technology.

Construction has begun on the Powerhouse Company-designed pavilion for the ING campus in Amsterdam. Located in the up-and-coming district of Amsterdam Southeast, the 900-square-meter pavilion seeks to “make a bold statement while integrating with its surroundings."

The clean, minimalist pavilion will sit at the heart of the ING campus, serving as both a dining area and a multifunctional space for the community. Emphasizing the natural landscape, the pavilion offers a synergy between the built and natural environment through a friendly circular form, a timber interior, and green Tichelaar tiles on the north and east facades.

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Videos

Powerhouse Company and Benthem Crouwel Architects have revealed their vision for the 2022 Asian Games Athlete Village International Zone in Hangzhou, China. The “Sponge City” proposal explores the sandy connection between land and water on a site which has recently been reclaimed from the sea.

The scheme, designed in collaboration with landscape architects SMARTLAND and Chinese firm UAD, forms a competition entry for the design of the village, the results of which are expected in August/September 2018. The team is one of six competing, including AS+P, SO-IL, NEXT Architects, Jadric Architektur, and Pelli Clarke Pelli Architects.

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Having previously assembled sets of images featuring the offices of architecture firms in Dubai, London, Paris, Beijing, Shanghai, Seoul, the Nordic countries, and Barcelona, architectural photographer Marc Goodwin continues the series with an exploration of 17 large and small offices in the Netherlands. Occupying buildings formerly used as offices, banks and old factories, the interior and exterior images capture a glimpse of the lives of these designers and their daily architectural surroundings.