Crossing Towers
Amsterdam, NL
Location: Amsterdam, NL
Year: 2016
Gross Floor Area: 0.5 ha
Program: Housing, Commercial, Parking
Client: Wonam
Height restrictions in cities like Amsterdam can prevent great locations from maximizing their potential for planning taller buildings. Our hypothetical design proposal, the “Crossing Towers” breaks open this restriction by making a three-dimensional urban community. The crossing towers consisting of 4 vertically and horizontally connected buildings, contributes both to a vertical city like Amsterdam’s growing skyline while marking the beginning of the transformation of an existing mono-functional office park into an exciting mixed-use urban neighborhood.
The two elegant towers with heights of 70m and 90m serve therefore as a gateway to a new high density community. While the interlocking bridges align with the highway and the metro line to create a context driven design statement. The expression of the Crossing Towers is double sided. Two of the facades have a hard side towards the highway to the north and west and the other two facades are more open and more green towards a smaller scale neighbouring community and sun to the south and east. Both the upper and lower bridge introduce rooftop sky gardens accessible to residents, allowing for outdoor activities, while generous public spaces at the heart of the development create people friendly places.
