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Nature-filled office takes over a former factory building in Amsterdam-Noord

A lush jungle of plants has sprung up in an unlikely place—a former warehouse in Amsterdam-Noord. Space Encounters transformed the post-industrial building into the new headquarters for the Dutch pushchair company Joolz, and in the process filled the renovated office with tropical gardens for an exotic and calming atmosphere.

Located in an emerging neighborhood of Amsterdam-Noord, the 1,600-square-meter renovated warehouse consists of a spacious industrial hall and office space. The architects removed all the interior walls and installed large windows along the facade to open the building up to views of the street and to bring in natural light, which also streams in through the existing factory skylights. Three transparent greenhouses filled with tropical plants and fish sit below the skylights and divide the open-plan office into two halves. The 50-square-meter glazed gardens improve indoor air quality, provide a cooling microclimate, and serve as a calming oasis in the post-industrial office.

“Extruded from three of the existing roof lights, they echo the scale and logic of what was already there,” write the architects about the glazed gardens. “Next to express the Joolz ideology by providing a pleasant backdrop for the daily routines, these large glazed gardens also improve the internal climate and provide employees with some more exotic choices to pick as their work locations for the day.” Worktables are placed next to the gardens, but benches are also nestled inside the gardens to let employees immerse themselves in nature. The Joolz project has been nominated for the Arc Awards 2016.

Nature-filled office takes over a former factory building in Amsterdam-Noord

Details

  • Amsterdam-Noord, Amsterdam, Netherlands
  • Space Encounters