Renovation of the former town hall in Ridderkerk

• Date 2000-2004
• Address Jonkheer Karnebeekweg – 2981 EA Ridderkerk (Netherlands)

Following the completion of the construction of Ridderkerk’s new town hall, Charles Vandenhove was commissioned to renovate the local authority’s former premises with a view to continuing to use them as offices. The four-storey building, with its characteristic modernist style of the late 1970s, is dominated by brick, concrete and glass. Vandenhove’s work focused initially on the exterior. Starting from the third floor, a fully glazed walkway connects the former premises to the new town hall. On the ground floor, adjoining the old building, a small two-storey structure with nine bays has been built, providing a new entrance to the administrative areas. Vandenhove highlights the new structure by playing on contrasts and favouring prefabricated concrete façades, in which the windows feature slightly curved glazing. Although the intervention is not particularly spectacular, it is, as in the new town hall, rich in meaning. The old carillon, a symbolic and historic landmark, has been retained and enveloped by an openwork structure made of afzelia timber at the top of the hexagonal tower which houses the fire escape staircase.

 

• Volumetry 3 archive boxes
• Bibliography

  Presentation dossier, Jeanne & Charles Vandenhove Foundation archives

• AUTHOR AND DATE OF THE ENTRY Sébastien Charlier, 2022