In Progress: PGGM Headquarters / Mateo Arquitectura

Written by Nico Saieh
Published on October 29, 2010

Architects: Josep Lluís Mateo / Mateo Arquitectura Location: Zeist, Utrecht, The Netherlands Project Leaders: Markus Lauber, Till von Mackensen Project Area: 25,000 sqm offices, 25,000 sqm car park Project Year: 2010 Photographs: Adrià Goula

Located nearby the city of Zeist, close to Utrecht, the tender put forward the requirement for increasing the offices in the current building by 25,000 sqm, and at the same time recover a park by means of the construction of a 25.000 sqm underground car park.

The project takes into consideration the relationship with the enviroment and the surrounding neighbourhood buildings in order to maintain compactness which recovers the logic of the increase in size of the inicial building.

The PGGM Company Headquarters extension works and the construction of the new building are in a well advanced stage of progress.

Josep Lluís Mateo specifications

By doubling the current surface area, the project will extend the PGGM pension fund headquarters in Zeist, near to Utrecht.

Our proposals put forward three types of intervention:

Clear all the land adjancent to the current building and construct a large underground car park and demolish various service pavilions. This would give way to the appearence of a large private park with no roadways, which would be the new context for the building.

Part of the extension would be built on the inside of the large patio resulting from the current building, which would greatly improve internal communications and bring life to the centre which is currently too empty. The building would be made of reflective glass and floating stainless steel.

Towards the outside and in keeping with the current building open shape, the new working areas would use the landscape created as a nearby exterior reference. They are repetitive glass buildings plus outside protective wood, corten steel cladding or canvas which would produce a textile warp in the cladding which supplements the glass reflecting abstraction.

The internal spaces supplement the usual working space areas with new communication and informal working areas, with a “La Rambla” longitudinal layout.

The auditoriums, the restaurants… are special functions that make the unit far more complex than the typical office flexible characteristics and casual areas. This is explained by being the headquarters of a great multinational company. the inside area will, therefore, be very varied and different.