Traditional facade wrapped up in a white veil

Architects Vyvey & Partners won a design competition for an apartment complex in the Belgian town of Ypres with their striking submission for social housing company, Ons Onderdak. The project uses a restrained palette of three tones of grey brick, together with white, partially curved, ROCKPANEL boards.

Despite the ultra modern look, the building fits well amongst the existing neighbouring houses. According to Jan Vyvey, that was also the starting point for the designers: “We wanted a compact building that fitted in with the mixture of buildings along this arterial road. Our building shape anticipates the surrounding house fronts. To the left it links to a block along the building line, to the right we integrate the more recessed house next-door by setting our building a bit farther back.

The project looks relatively small for the 12 apartments that it contains. The three different colours of grey brick gives each part its own character. It appears to be three large residences. The white panels form a sort of veil that wraps around the building and unifies it. We opted for white, which not only gives the building a bright aura, but also assures a beautiful effect of sun and shadow on the facade.”

One product, many applications

The architectural firm had several reasons for choosing ROCKPANEL. “The material offers the possibility of applying the panels in graceful curves. This gives a high degree of freedom and expressiveness. In this way we could create beautiful facade views with the play of lines in the back and with the stairs in the front.

We were also looking for a solution for the blind end facade. With ROCKPANEL boards we gave a horizontal accent to this end, in contrast to the vertical section in the main volume. This produced a harmonious bond between the front and back.

Finally, with ROCKPANEL we could apply a single product all around the building to create the veil effect. We used the panels for the facades, but also for the terraces, the balustrade and the stairway handrails. Because the product is easy to process, the detailing is simpler and the costs are lower. ROCKPANEL makes slender construction possible and can be applied in different ways. So for our project the end facade is ventilated, while other panels are installed for an insulated facade or applied as balustrade.”