Family Home

Leiden, Netherlands

The concept
The commission was to design a house with a frontal façade that is transparent for at least 50 %. The house should be sustainably flexible to attract different kinds of users and to be able to react on changing living patterns. The structure of vertical circulations within the house should efficiently connect the different lounge area’s and should have an important part in the concept of the entire house.

The design
The house occupies the entire site to create the maximum of space within the house. This extra space will be usable to create more quality in the interior space such as royal lounges and vacant spaces.
The different floors are connected through a big spiral staircase.The vacant spaces are situated in the surroundings of this staircase and they will visually connect all the floors. The stairs are an important sculptural element within the house and will provide it’s identity.

The primary appearance of the house is based on the archetype of a typical Dutch one-family house: the row house, covered by a roof structure. The façades are completely constructed out of glass. The frontage glass facade is covered by steel panels which will create a balance between daylighting requirements and transparency. The panels are perforated with motives of leaves. At ground floor level this will create a large amount of transparency, but the amount of perforating will decrease in height with a result of less transparency at higher floors. The use of leave-patterns at the backfaçades of these houses create a artificial nature at the collective inner court where the customary gardens are missing.