Groene Toren Eindhoven
The former office building called the Groene Toren in the center of Eindhoven has been converted into appartments and a hotel. In addition to a new functional layout of the floor plans, the façades have been completely renovated.
Placed between the original concrete belts are floor-to-ceiling aluminum facades, which makes the building look more slender and open up to the city. Diederendirrix made the architectural design for the transformation.
Architect Paul Diederen: ''the Groene Toren looks more slender and opens up more to the city.''
The former office building de Groene Toren, built in 1974 after a design by architect Dick van Mourik, has been converted into homes and a hotel. The tower is located at a busy location between the station and center highway the Vestdijk in Eindhoven.
Diederendirrix architecture & urbanism, which successfully transformed more office buildings into apartments, such as Philips Lighting a bit further in the center of Eindhoven, made the design for this transformation.
The rooftop bar has a panoramic view of the city.
Distribution of functions
The first to the seventh floor have been transformed into a four-star NH-hotel with 132 rooms. The hotel also has six conference rooms and a gym on the first floor.
The eighth to twelfth floors have been converted into 104 short-stay apartments. The thirteenth floor has 8 short-stay apartments, the other half of this layer has been converted into a restaurant that belongs to the NH hotel.
The restaurant is connected to the rooftop bar on the fourteenth floor via an open staircase and a new lift. The bar has a roof terrace on three sides with a panoramic view over the city. The residents of the apartments have a separate roof terrace. The existing restaurants on the ground floor have been renewed.
The maintenance of the existing concrete façade tires was technically difficult. The tires were coldly attached to the underlying concrete floor in the 1970s, resulting in a substantial thermal bridge.
The green appearance of the tower has been retained by Reynaers' bronze-colored aluminum façades with green tinted glass.
Maintaining concrete façade tires
The 50-meter high building is completely stripped, while retaining the concrete support structure and façade tires. Architect Paul Diederen has done a lot of effort to preserve those concrete façade tapes.
Nothing has changed in the new situation, the cold bridge has been solved by using an insulated floor strip that is covered with aluminum typesetting. "This strip can be read from inside as the aluminum plinth / strip for the frame.
Storey high folding windows
"All windows and the green façade panels inbetween have been removed. We have kept the tower's distinctive green appearance through the façades with floor-high bronze-colored aluminum façades from Reynaers Aluminium with green tinted glass ", explains Diederen.
In total, façade builder P. van Hoesel has installed no less than 5100 m² of aluminum frames and curtain walls. The new glass façade makes the building lighter and more accessible. "The frames span the entire floor height from concrete strip to concrete strip. The narrowing in the concrete belts at the location of the end façades is thus also reflected in the height of the frames. A nice piece of custom work.
On summer days, the open folding windows provide a dynamic façade.
Residents and hotel guests can open a large part of the façade through the folding façades and internal French balconies.
The lofts and hotel rooms have folding doors and internal French balconies, so that residents and hotel guests can open a large part of the façade. French balconies with folding doors are also included in the fitness room and in the restaurant. The rooftop bar can open the façades almost entirely on three sides with multiple folding doors, so that the interior space is in open communication with the roof terrace. "On summer days, many open folding windows provide a dynamic façade," says Diederen.
The glazing of the tower is not uniform as a result of differentiation in noise load (traffic noise). In order to obtain exactly the same green appearance around the glass, the outer leaf of the double glass used is uniformly designed as 8 mm thick, colored green glass. The inner leaf is blank and varies in thickness according to the building-physical requirements that are set for this.
Sound buffer
"To prevent noise nuisance, we have built a complete box-in-box construction for the often noisy catering facility 'At the Movies'." For years, it has been located on the north-west corner of the Groene Toren, on the ground floor and first floor. In addition, the office, the changing rooms, laundry and storage room of the hotel on the second floor serve as a sound buffer for the hotel rooms above.
Façade builder P. van Hoesel has installed 5100 m² of aluminum frames and curtain walls in the tower.
Short-stay apartments
The eighth to thirteenth floors have been transformed into 82 studios and 30 two-room apartments, whose surface area ranges from 20 to 68 m2. All 112 homes are rented furnished for a short period.
Students from the Netherlands can rent accommodation here for a maximum of six months, while foreign students can only spend a maximum of twelve months. Residents have on the ground floor a bicycle shed and a laundry room. On the top floor there is a communal roof terrace for the residents.
Video Wall
Finally, the architect points out a special addition: "To make the image more dynamic from the station, we have integrated a 43 meter high video screen in the front façade, from the 1st to the 13th floor." This video wall consists of a combination of LED strips and LED cassettes.
To make the image of the building more dynamic from the station, we have integrated a 43 meter high video screen in the front façade, from the 1st to the 13th floor.
The LED cassettes with full-motion display cover a surface of 16 m high and 7 m wide, the rest of the façade is filled with self-tinting LED strips. The full-motion display does not cover the full height because this would impose unachievable restrictions on the content to be displayed.
This text was written by Jacqueline Knudsen from Eisma Bouwmedia.
