Amsterdam Zuidas Gate Wall | Anna Dolcetta

This is my graduation project. It is focused on researching and developing a Public Interior space where people gather together. The project statement is to give new vitality to an almost dead place, Amsterdam Zuidas, the new city business district of Amsterdam. I chose to develop the project along the west border because it connect the Vrij University of Amsterdam and residential areas with Zuidas. My goal was to bring students in the area improving the feeling of being inside a real city centre. Because of this I design a student centre where the students world can meet the business one. Moreover I developed the new west train station entrance. The project has an essential design but at the same time it has a strong potential as urban infrastructure, landscape mark and interior space. Since my first reaction to Zuidas was to criticize it, I chose to develop the design in opposition to the context. The design result shows that the project has been horizontally developed contrasting the high rise towers of the business district becoming a landscape mark that underline the most important border of Zuidas, the west one. Moreover the project acts as a gate for Zuidas for trains, cars and pedestrians.