CONTEMPORARY

PROCESSES IN
ARCHITECTURE-AR6014

ASSIGNMENT-1
 UN STUDIO
Founded in 1988 by Ben van Berkel and Caroline Bos.
The initials "UN" stand for United Network, a reference to the collaborative
nature of the practice comprising individuals from various countries with
backgrounds and technical training in numerous fields.
 • Founder - Ben van Berkel (born 1957) is
a Dutch architect; founder and principal
architect of the architectural
practice UNStudio. With his studio he
designed, among others, the Erasmu
Bridge in Rotterdam, the Moebius House in the
Netherlands, the Mercedes-Benz Museum in
Stuttgart, Germany, Arnhem Central Station,
the Singapore University of Architecture and
Design, Raffles City in Hangzhou and
numerous other buildings.
• Co-Founder -Caroline Bos (born
1959, Rotterdam) is a Dutch architect. She is a
co-founder of UNStudio, a large award-
winning architecture firm in Amsterdam. Bos
writes, lectures and teaches architecture at
various schools. Her architectural drawings and
models are shown at museums like MoMA.

UN STUDIO TEAM
• UNStudio has worked internationally since its inception
and has produced a wide range of work ranging from
public buildings, infrastructure, offices, living, products,
to urban masterplans.
• Some of the projects include:
• Arnhem Centraal station, Netherlands(1996-2015)
• The new Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart (2001–2006)
• Theatre Agora in Lelystad (2002–2007)

UN STUDIO Projects
 • The station is the result of an
ambitious 20-year project – master
planned by UNStudio – to
redevelop the wider station area;
the largest post-war development
in Arnhem. Backed by the Dutch
government, this transfer hub
rewrites the rulebook on train
stations and is the most complex of
its type in Europe.

• The station will become the new ‘front door’ of the city, embracing the spirit of
travel, and is expected to establish Arnhem as an important node between
Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium. The new terminal houses commercial
areas, and a conference centre and provides links to the nearby office plaza, city
centre, underground parking garage and the Park Sonsbeek.

Arnhem Central Transfer Terminal , Netherlands

 Transfer Terminal features a dramatic
twisting structural roof geometry, which
enables column-free spans of up to 60m in
the transfer hall. Taking references from the
continuous inside/outside surface of a Klein
Bottle, UNStudio aimed to blur distinctions
between the inside and outside of the
terminal by continuing the urban landscape
into the interior of the transfer hall, where
ceilings, walls and floors all seamlessly
transition into one another.

Arnhem Central Transfer

Terminal , Netherlands
UNStudio began the masterplan
in 1996 and completed its first
sketch design for the Transfer
Terminal back in 2000. After
intensively researching passenger
flows and transportation modes,
UNStudio proposed that the new
terminal should expand to
become a ‘transfer machine’ that
incorporates the whole spectrum
of public transport, meeting the
travel demands of the 21st
century.

• Arnhem Central is no longer just a train station. It has become a transfer hub.
• Integrating the naturally sloping landscape distinctive to Arnhem, UNStudio conceived the
Transfer Terminal as a flowing, utilitarian landscape of different functions stacked up to four
storeys above ground and two below.
In 2001, Arnhem Central
acquired the status from the
Dutch Government as of one
of the ‘New Key Projects’
(station areas of national
importance). These stations
should function as catalysts
for urban renewal and
economic growth. It is
anticipated that the new
Transfer Terminal, which
replaces a 1950s train station,
will facilitate economic
growth by enabling a vastly
increased daily passenger
flow to the city of 110,000
commuters per day in 2020.
• The 35,000sqm project designed by UN Studio between 2001-2006, includes also a
restaurants, stores, offices and an auditorium.
• The Mercedes-Benz Museum sets up an interface for a series of radical spatial principles
in order to create a completely new typology
• The Mercedes-Benz Museum is a cultural landmark that unites the past, present and
future of this legendary car. Located beside Mercedes-Benz Factory in Stuttgart.

Mercedes-Benz Museum, Stuttgart

• Museum offers visitors a journey through time.
• A double helix structure, intertwining along gallery spaces.
Spiraling around a spectacular central atrium, one path winds
through the vehicle collection displays; the other through
historical exhibits.
• How visitors experience the museum:
• They do not begin their visit to the exhibition at a conventional
entrance at the base of the building. They are transported by
lift to the top floor. Here they have the choice of two tours,
during which they descend through the building. The paths of
each tour meet on each floor, enabling visitors to switch
between tours – the Collections tour and Legend tour – should
they wish to do so.

Mercedes-Benz Museum, Stuttgart

Mercedes-Benz Museum, Stuttgart
• The Agora Theatre is an extremely colourful building, part of the masterplan for Lelystad
• This was designed by Adriaan Geuze, aimed to revitalize the pragmatic, sober town
centre, with a mission of reviving and recovering the post-war Dutch new towns
• The design focusses on the archetypal function of a theatre - creating a world of artifice
and enchantment.
• Both inside and outside walls are faceted to reconstruct a kaleidoscopic experience of the
world of the stage, where-in you can never be sure of what is real and what is not.

Theatre Agora in Lelystad

• In the Agora theatre drama and performance are not restricted to the stage and to the
evening, but are extended to the urban experience and to daytime.
• The typology of the theatre is fascinating in itself, but Ben van Berkel, aimed to exploit
the performance element of the theatre and of architecture in general far beyond its
conventional functioning.
• The generative, proliferating, unfolding effect of the architectural project continues
beyond its development in the design studio in its subsequent public use.

Theatre Agora in Lelystad

 • The envelope is generated to place the two
auditoriums as far apart from each other as possible
for acoustic reasons.
• A larger and a smaller theatrical space, a stage tower,
several interlinked and separate foyers, numerous
dressing rooms, multifunctional rooms, a café and a
restaurant are all brought together within one volume
that protrudes dramatically in various directions.
• All of the facades have sharp angles and jutting planes,
which are covered by steel plates and glass, often
layered, in shades of yellow and orange.
• These protrusions afford places where the spectacle of
display is continued off-stage and the roles of
performer and viewer may be reversed.
• The artist’s foyer, for instance, is above the entrance,
enabling the artists to watch the audience approaching
the theatre from a large, inclined window.

Theatre Agora in Lelystad

• The design of the theatre explores the integration of theatre arts and new media into
sculpttural form.
• The building’s envelope is composed of an overlapping multi-faceted surface that,
because of perforations, creates a kaleidoscopic effect.
• Internally, the vertical foyer and its grand staircase is designed as an element that carves
through the centre of the building’s volume, clearly delineating trajectories and
orientation with the interconnecting theatres and congress halls

Theatre Agora in Lelystad

Thank you
311213251099 – S. Vidhya Lakshmi