PROJECT

passive crèche and 7 passive homes in Deurne

CLIENT

AG Vespa

ARCHITECT

BULK Architecten

CONTRACTOR

DCA nv

FACING BRICKS

Hand-Made facing bricks:

Nature7 Brick B

PROCESSING

traditional brickwork with a slightly recessed horizontal joint    

Photos: © Sepp van Dun   

The project lies in the middle of a block in the Conforta district and consists of a passive crèche, an underground car park and seven passive homes with a large roof terrace and four compact smaller homes.

In the middle of the block is a large oblong garden.

The architects were faced with the challenge of creating a block while focussing on light, air and space.

The crèche has been constructed from the street to the garden, as a sort of barcode with varying characters. The homes are located above it and benefit from a large terrace and luxurious width. 

BULK Architecten: “A brick building was the obvious choice for a rough working-class district. Brick creates the right tone in the city: solid and warm, not too cold or too fragile.

In order to make the building passive, we chose the solid passive construction concept using thick façade elements (42 cm) with 19 cm insulation. A brick, 7 cm thick, helped to limit the thickness of the façades to some extent.”  

Between the entrances to the homes, the façade is pushed inwards at certain intervals, creating recesses which are alternately located on the street or inside the building. The facing brick is then continued around the corner, right into the crèche itself.

Facing bricks on the inside create a warm feel and also have good acoustic properties. The windows are also set deep in the façade construction. Recesses and deep edges not only give the façade a rugged character but also help to create shade for the passive homes.

The pleasant 1:3 ratio of the Hand-Made Nature7 Brick B works fantastically well here: in quarter bond, it creates an extremely restful pattern with little cutting waste for the contractor.