Plaswyck Park is a popular park and zoo in a suburb of Rotterdam. The clients wanted to move the main public entrance to the opposite side of the park and to have new offices, a restaurant and a shop near the new entrance. They also asked us to look at new proposals for accessing the site by car, coach and foot.
I was asked to collaborate on Plaswyck Park with a Dutch architect, Evelien Van Veen, with whom I had studied at the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London.
We proposed a pedestrian bridge which would solve safety problems and act as a bold advertisement for the park. The main intention was to make a series of fun spaces and structures with a variety of materials to constantly stimulate the children visiting the park.
The materials are a simple contrast of old and new: a free-flowing thatched roof wrapping over glass and steel frame cubes.
It was an interesting change to work for Dutch clients who seem more open to new ideas than their British counterparts. They particularly liked the naive photomontages we used to present our ideas.
