From industrial area to high-quality live-work area
The Hamer Quarter is a high-quality inner-city redevelopment. The business park is being gradually transformed into a lively living and working environment, where living and working are combined with attractive public spaces. What’s special about the transformation is the way the existing production industry and creative companies are being preserved as much as possible and given a new place within the area.
Project info
Status
In development
Historical context
In an urban planning scheme, the municipality of Amsterdam has defined the ambitions, principles, and frameworks for the transformation of the area. From this, the typological Hammerblock emerged, a composite building block where residential and work buildings are placed within a landscape of production halls. The roofs of the production halls are designed as shared gardens.
As an expert in transformation, architecture, and urban planning, Mei was asked by the municipality of Amsterdam to contribute ideas to the development of the plan and the urban planning conditions, to help take the plan to a higher level. Mei works on both the city scale and the user scale. Workshop Architects, Civic Architects, and Beta-office are also collaborating on the project.
Mix of program and mix of scale
The development of the Hamer Quarter is a complex task where work, living, and daily life come together. The existing business activity and production industry are retained, and blocks of residential and work spaces are alternated with production halls. With the user and the desired program in mind, Mei developed a design approach within the urban planning framework based on four principles: phasing, block street, bike corridor, and live-work homes.
Phasing
The current Hamerkwartier has a complex ownership structure with many owners. Mei looked into how the area can develop within this structure so that it can continue to function well even during the transformation. Thanks to the natural phasing, the current owners aren’t forced to jump straight into the transformation. This means the duration of the project’s phasing isn’t fixed.
Live-work homes
The urban planning design focuses on creating a mixed live-work area with mainly large production halls. Mei suggests adding a smaller scale of live-work homes there. By making room for (growing) start-ups and small-scale businesses alongside housing, it creates an appealing liveliness at street level.
