Heritage projects

In Curacao, many of the historical buildings are part of the protected monumental township of Willemstad. Our office here is one of them. A good example of how we deal with protected cityscapes. We transformed the old workers’ house into an office building. The adjacent building was also part of this project, which is used as an apartment. From a historical architectural stand point, they both are interesting as an example of a dwelling with a traditional design and gable roof.

In some cases, monuments have been modified over the centuries in terms of elements or color. As is the case with the Kortijnweg in Curacao, also part of the protected townscape of Willemstad. This house is a building from the Art Deco era. You can still see details that match this architectural style, such as the horizontal lines in the façade and the windows with green glass windowpanes. The house was once painted blue. Since the colors of the house are not part of its monumental status, the only requirement is that all elements are opaquely painted. We choose to investigate corresponding colors to the Art Deco style.

Sometimes the wishes of today require new construction. An existing building sometimes needs to be expanded, as was the case with Museum Hilversum. Here you can see how an expansion can fully fit in with the style of the existing historical monument. The existing building was not suitable as an exhibition building. An expansion was therefore necessary. The new museum was approximately 1,200 square meters and a new volume was added. With the design we copied the facade of the existing building, but we applied it in a way that made it more modern and developed it with techniques of today.

And then there are cases where new construction exists in a different style than the monument. In our opinion, this can go well together. The result is clearly visible at the Mongui Maduro Library, which is located right next to the historic plantation house Rooi Catootje. What makes our design for the library really interesting is the different types of views to the outside. Nature is a big part of our design here, and even though the building has a modern appearance it still was designed by the same ideas as Rooi Catootje. Where maintaining contact with the surrounding nature is key and where you work the elements (i.e. the wind) into your design. We’ve left the rough surrounding nature as it was and made the building fit into that.

Heritage projects can also be of enormous size, which means that as a designer you need to make a good large-scale analysis of which components are essential to preserve. Our biggest heritage project was the restoration and repurposing of the old Monastery in Scharloo on Curacao. In total 1200 m2! We had to make some additions to make the hotel user-friendly. Such as bringing daylight back into the building. Over time, the building had become a dark ‘dungeon’. However, our adjustments were always in the shadow of the monument.

Not all heritage survives… In places where hurricanes destroy many buildings, monuments are also destroyed. For the community it can be important to rebuilt the historic sites, but then it will raise the question: is it still authentic?  Reconstructing heritage buildings is in some cases the only right option. And in the case of Captains Quarters on Saba it was even necessary to preserve the site’s historical significance. This historic building is currently being transformed into a residential home.

And lastly on this list: how do you work on the renovation of a monumental building that does not have monument status? We have approached several projects from our portfolio as if they were monuments because of their special, historical value. This was also the case with our project Villa Emmastad in Curacao. An old Shell residential area. You start with an analysis and determine which elements are indispensable to preserve the story of this building.

When analyzing the house we were amazed by the steel structure, even the battens of the roof were made of steel. We kept those parts of the original building and we added some new elements. Only the backyard needed a complete transformation…