Rijnstraat 8: Meeting Center for All Ministries

expanding design practices, Middle Density, OMA, Project, Technology and fabrication, Urban Paradigms

Active Public Spaces, Agency of Urban Organization, Atrium, City views, Developing policies, Empowering society, Innovation, Masterplan, Multifunctional building, Office building, Project, Renewal, Renovation, Sustainability, Technological Approach, The Hague, The Netherlands, Transformation

Upon its completion in 1992, Rijnstraat 8, the former Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment (VROM) building represented both an innovative office typology – its atriums served as conservatories: the outside brought inside – and a leading example of sustainability. Today the building, designed by in the 1980s, no longer offers the flexibility and openness required of a contemporary office space. In collaboration with the original architect, Jan Hoogstad, and in the context of a Public Private Partnership under the name of PoortCentraal (consisting of BAM, ISS and OMA), OMA has developed an integrated concept for the building based on a renewal of its existing architectural qualities.