The development of the access zone for the Diepenbeek campus can make a significant contribution to a dynamic area of the city where knowledge, talent, and entrepreneurship have ample room to unfold, by taking on the role of an intermediary link and supportive infrastructure for synergies. Sufficient attention must be given to flexibility to accommodate growth challenges, enable new functions, and support the evolving identity of the campus.
Currently, there is no clear answer to the traffic and green-blue infrastructure that will be placed at ground level in the future. The proposal must, therefore, be able to accommodate adjustments both after the construction phase and during the design process. A flexible design and construction methodology are thus essential.
Rather than a design proposal, we offer a design strategy. Our proposal is based on the connection of two (or three) buildings and one (or multiple) bridge sequences. Together, they form a cohesive whole but each with its own identity and structural logic. Spatially, they tell a shared story, but in terms of construction and placement, they are independent of each other.
The motorized access to the campus cuts through it like a knife. This necessary infrastructure goes against the idea of a campus focused on connectivity, serving as both a social barrier and an obstacle to ecological corridors between the south and north. Water and vegetation play a unifying role in the proposal, linking the buildings in the access zone with the campus. They create unity within a campus of individual buildings.
in collaboration with MAKER architecten
