The Bunker Tower Eindhoven apartments, Dutch residential property, Architecture images
The Bunker Tower in Eindhoven
Hugh Maaskant Building in The Netherlands – Dutch Housing design by Powerhouse Company Architects
Finalist for the International High-Rise Award
Design: Powerhouse Company
Location: Eindhoven, North Brabant, The Netherlands
Photos: Sebastian van Damme
Bunker Tower High-Rise Award
Bunker Tower is selected as a finalist for the International High-Rise Award (IHA) 2024. As one of five projects, the jury selected the finalists — representing projects from Asia, Europe, and South America — from a total of 31 high-rise buildings across 14 countries.
We are excited to present our project to both the German and international audience at the upcoming exhibition and award ceremony. Bunker Tower represents a thoughtful and innovative response to pressing urban challenges, while also respecting its architectural heritage.
The project addresses the need for housing and urban densification in rapidly growing cities. At the same time, it has breathed new life into the 1970s brutalist ‘bunker,’ transforming it into 3,000 square meters of office space and public amenities, including a Grand Café. This transformation culminated in the building being listed as a historic landmark, showcasing the potential of existing structures to meet today’s housing challenges in the Netherlands.
‘With this high-rise design, we make
a positive contribution to the urban landscape, in line with the increasing focus on sustainable and responsible urban development, both in the Netherlands and beyond.’
Nanne de Ru, Founder, Powerhouse Company
20 Jan 2023
Design: Powerhouse Company
Location: Eindhoven, North Brabant, The Netherlands
Photos: Sebastian van Damme
The Bunker Tower, Holland
Reviving the Bunker
Hugh Maaskant’s 1970s classic was the original mensa and fraternity building of TU Eindhoven. The students nicknamed it the Bunker given to its brutalist structure. In recent years, however, it had fallen into disrepair, and only narrowly escaped demolition.
Together with developers RED Company and Being Development, we won the 2016 competition set by the University of Eindhoven to decide the Bunker’s future. By adding a residential tower, we generate the extra value needed to fund the painstaking restoration of the original building.
Adding the tower also allowed underground parking, enabling the transformation of the existing parking lot into a public park surrounding the complex as designed by DELVA Landscape Architecture & Urbanism. With its green surroundings and unique residential opportunities, the Bunker brings a new impetus to the whole area and Eindhoven as a whole, as it joins several new architectural landmarks in the city.
A bold solution
Our design daringly unites the new residential tower with the original structure, by adopting the language and materiality of the old Bunker. Rather than resorting to traditional solutions of designing ‘around’ monuments – with either a strict separation or a strong contrast between old and new – we made the new tower a bold and imaginative continuation of Maaskant’s architectural style.
The new residential tower is flanked by the two wings of the original structure, which houses a semi-public café, lobby, and an office space. The base also houses several of the 210 apartments that the tower contains. In three distinct sections, Bunker Tower lifts Maaskant’s design language into new territory, twisting dynamically and becoming progressively lighter and more open as it rises.
‘Bunker Tower reveals so many sides, different vignettes, depending on where you are in the city. And every apartment has different views, despite the repeating floor plan.’
Meagan Kerr, Project Leader, Architect
Layered with light
The tower’s asymmetrical and stepped form again channels Maaskant’s design and presents varying perspectives from different parts of the city. The greater expanses of glass at the top of the tower symbolize the reopening of the previously boarded-up building to the city, and provide wonderful views for the new residents. Adding the tower also allowed underground parking, enabling the transformation of a paved parking lot into a surrounding public park – additions which effectively boost the entire area. Now preserved for the future, the former Bunker gains a new lease of life thanks to the Bunker Tower.
The Bunker Tower in Eindhoven, Holland – Building Information
Architects: Powerhouse Company – https://www.powerhouse-company.com/
Landscape architect: DELVA Landscape Architecture & Urbanism
Clients: RED Company, Being Development
Location: Eindhoven, NL
Size: 32 640 sqm
Status: Completed
Photography: Sebastian van Damme
The Bunker Tower, Eindhoven, NL images / information received 200123
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Location: Eindhoven, North Brabant, south of the Netherlands
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