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Stationspostgebouw in The Hague, a flexible yet balanced working space

Kraaijvanger Architects

Interior  /  Completed
Kraaijvanger Architects

PostNL’s request was an interior that prioritizes the well-being and satisfaction of their employees, an environment where their team members feel happy, enjoy coming to work, and can collaborate effectively. The monumental building features a unique layout and atmosphere with deep floor fields, a glass facade, and strong construction elements. It embodies Bremer's style of large, compact, and minimal ornamentation. The renovation includes adding mezzanine levels and large voids to enhance natural light. Balancing the building's scale, the challenge was to create smaller, intimate units while maximizing daylight.

The building's spatial arrangement, characterized by its rhythmic monumentality, shapes the interior design, ensuring a comfortable atmosphere by creating smaller, more intimate units. The layout along the facade incorporates wooden frames filled with textile, serving multiple purposes such as privacy, light transmission, acoustic attenuation, filtered transparency, and spatial definition. The furniture complements this structure, providing options for collaborative or individual work, fostering diversity. The interior predominantly features sustainable natural and technical materials such as wood, loam plaster, residual stream bricks, textile, magnetic colored glass, self-healing steel, and biobased binder terrazzo.

The interior meets WELL and BREEAM guidelines and has received an 'Excellent' BREEAM-in-use certification. With that it is the most sustainable renovated monument in the Netherlands. The interior is focused on people’s health by taking into account the physical, psychological, and social needs. By creating a healthy indoor climate with as much experience of natural light as possible. Connecting with nature by using natural materials and integrating indoor greenery, material use that is free of toxic substances and a high comfort level of furniture. Sustainability measures were implemented to extend its lifespan.15% of the floor area is highly flexible, with adjustable walls. Detachable features for easy reuse and recycling. Renewable and secondary materials are prioritized.

Many offices are too closed off and isolated or they are completely open without any privacy and silence. A good workspace is all about balance. We therefore introduced the typology of a house within this large office building; because, a house tends to have a good balance between partially defined spaces, a diversity of space sizes, connected in different ways. This structure fits the social structure, behavior, and needs of people. The work environment is future-proof due to the high degree of multifunctionality in the use and arrangement of the various spaces. This makes the work environment suitable in the long term for the incorporation of new forms of work and changing team sizes. So whether you want to concentrate on your work or want to confer without disturbing others, it is all possible within reasonable distance. A diverse social work landscape is the result; an environment for working, being, doing, learning, feeling and celebrating together. The building's interior design reflects its monumental character and aligns with the organization's core values of diversity, inclusion, and well-being. It aims to appeal to people of all generations and create a sense of belonging for both long-time employees and new talent.

"It's very functional on the one hand, but it's also intimate, despite its size. It's very focused on hybrid working. So we can meet in any conference room, but also meet with people who work from home. The new way of working is really integrated into the building. " Herna Verhagen (CEO Post NL)

Credits

 Den Haag
 Paesi Bassi
 PostNL Sens Real estate
 Office
 06/2022
 25.000 m2
 Confidential
 Kraaijvanger Architects (interior) KCAP (exterior)
 Dirk Jan Postel, Chantal Vos, Linda Brouwer, Edward Timmermans, David Kooymans, Elena Khasianova, Eveline Withagen, Sharmila Nasheed, Bart van der Werf, Anne Ketelaar
 Ossip van Duivenbode

Curriculum

Kraaijvanger Architects is an internationally operating architectural firm, founded in 1927 and based Rotterdam where we work with about 70 professionals on a wide variety of projects.
In everything we do, it is our ambition to reconnect people and nature through timeless architecture with a positive social and ecological footprint.

With generous, inclusive designs, we serve our client and society. Our designs have the resilience to accommodate the diversity of constantly changing social needs and activities. And shows a wide variety of projects: from revitalization of cities, large public buildings and innovative industries to housing, interiors, and specials.

We share a strong belief in the future, and that is why we work on sustainable buildings that purify the air, contain biodiversity, share space in surprising ways, provide energy, make people healthier and happier, and are 100% reusable.

https://www.kraaijvanger.nl/en...


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