Description:
On 13 May 2008 a devastating fire destroyed an iconic building in Delft and a place of work for thousands of students and staff: an entire community lost its home. Within a year’s time a disused, former university’s building was reclaimed and transformed to re-house the faculty of Architecture of Delft University of Technology. The premises – a monumental complex of 32,000m² listed as ‘Red Chemistry’ - was designed around 1920 to accommodate the faculty of Chemistry. The complex, designed by Dutch architect G. van Drecht, is listed as one of the greatest pre-war university buildings in Dutch cultural heritage. After the renovation - completed with the extensions of the conservatories - this complex of 36,000m² was renamed into BK City. ‘BK’ refers to Architecture in Dutch and ‘City’ emphasizes the main goal of this project: to design a vibrant city with its public functions (to meet each other intellectually and socially) and its connecting places. The pressure of the process, the limited resources and the unique opportunity of combining academic knowledge and architectural practises have produced a building that is both a test case and a showcase for the campus of the future.