We just received this from OMA: After almost 12 years in the boards, OMA announced that the De Rotterdam complex will enter construction during December 2009, expecting completion in 2013.
Tree stacked towers with a total height of 150m, will result on a gross floor area of approximately 160,000m2, making De Rotterdam the largest building in the Netherland, with a total cost of €340m.
The mixed-use program (offices, apartments, a hotel, conference facilities, gym, shops, restaurants, and cafes) and the resulting density make this project a vertical city, located in the old harbour district of Wilhelminapier, next to the iconic Erasmus bridge.
“The towers are part of the ongoing redevelopment of Wilhelminapier, and aim to reinstate the vibrant urban activity – trade, transport, leisure – once familiar to the neighbourhood. De Rotterdam is named after one of the ships on the Holland America Line, which used to depart from the Wilhelminapier in decades past, carrying thousands of Europeans emigrating to the US.”
A project this big during crisis? Rem Koolhaas sees this as an opportunity: “one of the positive outcomes of the economic crisis is the drop in the cost of materials and construction, which has given new energy to long running projects like this one.”
The project is led by OMA partners Rem Koolhaas, Ellen van Loon and Reinier de Graaf and the associate in charge is Kees van Casteren.
All images OMA
