Architects: Bjarne Mastenbroek and Winy Maas (MVRDV)

Client: Koek - Wesseling Families

Project Date:1995 - 1997
Location: 124 a/b Koningslaan, Utrecht, The Netherlands
Project Size: 300 m
2
Double House
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MVRDV
MVRDV was set up in Rotterdam (Netherlands) in 1993 by Winy Maas, Jacob van Rijs and Nathalie de
Vries. In close collaboration the 3 principal architect directors produce designs and studies in the felds
of architecture, urbanism and landscape design. Early projects such as the headquarters for the Public
Broadcasting Company VPRO and the WoZoCo housing for elderly in Amsterdam brought MVRDV to the
attention of a wide feld of clients and reached international acclaim...
Current projects in progress or on site include various housing projects in the Netherlands, Spain, China,
France, Austria, the United Kingdom, USA and other countries, a television centre for Zrich, a public library
in Spijkenisse (Netherlands), a central market hall in Rotterdam, a culture plaza in Nanjing, China, large
scale urban masterplans in Oslo, Norway, Tirana, Albania and a masterplan for an eco-city in Logrono,
Spain...
The more than sixty architects, designers and staff members of MVRDV are organized into teams headed
by project leaders... Each design team is led by one of the principal architects and a senior architect /
project manager...
The work of MVRDV is published and exhibited worldwide and received many international awards.
MVRDV pursues a fascination for
radical methodical research: on
density and on public realms
& Mastenbroek
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Bjarne Mastenbroek is one of few dutch architects who integrate natural elements in their designs as
often as possible... Mastenbroeks ambition is to give strong spatial and natural qualities also to buildings
on urban locations, especially in housing. He emphasizes the importance of the balance between built
volume and green open space in the closest neighbourhood.
SeARCH is established in 2002 by Bjarne Mastenbroek and Ad Bogerman. Before SeARCH Bjarne
Mastenbroek has worked in the Van Gameren Mastenbroek projectteam which was part of the
architectengroep in Amsterdam since 1993. Currently the Executive Board of SeARCH consists of
Bjarne Mastenbroek & Uda Visser.
Consisting of 10 international architects, designers and staff members, SeARCH develops architectural
and urban projects and does research on architecture, landscaping, urbanism and new building
products and materials. SeARCH collaborates with different disciplines to experiment and test the
results of collective design sessions in order to give an opportunity to innovative, original and unexpected
proposals... Current projects by SeARCH differ from small scale private housing to large scale mixed-
use projects in the Netherlands and Europe. Key projects are a new synagogue and an offce building in
Amsterdam, a watch-tower in Putten, a museum in Enschede (in collaboration w/ Rem Koolhaas), large
scale mixed-use projects in Leuven, Belgium and a conference and activity centre in Hillerd, Denmark.
Five foor plans and one longitudinal section
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Side elevation and three sections
Vertical wall sections
(above) and horizontal
wall sections (left)
front elevation side elevation
Exterior elevation photo Section/perspective sketch
Details of rear facade
Opinions
In a suburban street by a splendid nineteenth-century park in Utrecht, two independent
families share a single site. Both wish to combine the fnest view of the park with easy
access to the street, the garden and the roof. By proposing the house with the least
imaginable depth, the program can be stretched up to four or fve stories while keeping the
garden as big as possible. Interpreting the partition wall as a therapeutic frst move towards
negotiations between the neighbours and their sometimes conficting wishes, has given birth
to two interlocking dwelling volumes, each richer than the premise underlying them both.
The bedrooms are incorporated in the meandering tops as houses-in-a-house. Both living
spaces extend along the facade and provide views of the park. Here extreme differences
can coexist: where one occupant wants to be surrounded by the garden, the other can
withdraw to the piano nobile. Where the one chooses a salon just past the childrens
playrooms, the other opts for a work-cum-bedroom upstairs, and so on. Their mutual
dependence at frst threatened to paralyse them. But as in the parable of the lame and the
blind, together they proved to be more than they could have possibly imagined themselves
to be as individuals.
El Croquis, 1997
The home is located in a row of isolated houses at the edge of Wilhelminapark. The facade of the house reveals the
subdivision, intersection and complexity of the space it encloses, presenting as its facade a graphic structure reminiscent
of the geometries of Theo van Doesburg in an apparently arbitrary arrangement which is a paragon of free architecture. The
outer surface plays with transparency and opacity, alternating different types of glass with panels of dark-painted plywood
which hide what glass would reveal: the most private parts of the house.
One house may give up volume to the other house next door on one foor, only to take it back on the next level. Only a
cross section fully reveals the special nature of this project: different "pieces of space" ft together like a jigsaw puzzle, making
up a single whole with the spatial continuum of its interior projected on its faade, like Le Corbusier's early project for the villa
in Carthage. The smaller of the two homes, on the left as seen from the road, has its kitchen and dining room on the ground
foor, separated by the stairway; a small mezzanine on the next foor overlooks the rooms below and leads into the living
room. The bedrooms are on the next foor up: the only closed rooms, along with the bathroom on the top foor, which offers
access to a little hidden rooftop patio. The home next door is larger, with an entrance, garage and guestroom on the ground
foor; the frst foor is completely open, and contains the living room and kitchen; the second foor with its two bedrooms is
much smaller.
Above this more rooms of various sizes take back space from the house next door. The rooftop patio is accessed by a
withdrawing ladder. The project was originally conceived in cross section. The original idea was a simple vertical subdivision
of the volume of the lot; but step by step, the homes gradually intersected, tied together in a box of glass and wood.
In the end, spaces were interwoven without blending together, borders were shifted foor by foor, and alignments were
exchanged until the architects settled on this fnal solution. The dividing wall between the two apartments weaves back and
forth like a snake, stretching the possibilities of reinforced concrete to their limit.
Flores Zanchi
As the name of this project suggests, the house is
designed for two families. Originally, it was meant for
two business people but due to fnancial constraints,
they found another couple to pool their resources in
order to make this project possible. Instead of simply
splitting the site into halves for each of the two
families, the architects designed the houses to be
interlocked together three-dimensionally in order to
have bigger living spaces that almost stretch across
the entire width of the site.
One of the living rooms occupies the entire frst foor
while the other occupies the second foor. Both
families have equal views of the exterior from their
living room and both have their own entrances,
one at the front of the building and one at the side.
Although the families get their own spaces within
the house, the garden at the back of the house is
shared.
Due to budget restrictions, the exterior of the house
is clad with plywood. With time, the house's exterior
reddish brown color that appears in most of the
magazines and books fades away into a grayish
brown. This may have been caused by lack of
maintenance and the wear and tear by Mother
Nature. The rest of the material for the exterior is
glass.
The way the architects located the glass and wood
panels defnes the space within by using glass for
more communal spaces and having wood panels to
hide the more private spaces.
Wilma Kwan 2003, updated 2005
How to visit: The house is located on Koningslaan
which is on the way to the Schroder house from
central station. Either take Bus 3 to Meklenburglaan
or if biking from the central train station, head east
towards Wilhelmina Park. Once you go through the
park, make a right turn onto Koningslaan and it is
not too far before you will see the house on your left
hand side.
This is a private residence; it is not open to public.
The exterior can be viewed from the small park
across the street from the house.
distribution of forces distribution of forces on fourth level
party wall and head elevations drainage system
stability in north-south direction windowless facade
KBWW House Conceptual
KBWW House is named (as a
MvRDv's habit?) after the initials
of it's owners. The Double Villa
is one of a row at the Utrecht's
city park. Remarkably, the
original buyer did not have the
means, nor needed the space
of the whole lot of ground he
bought. Consequently, they
searched and found a partner
who agreed to take over one
third of the space.
This became the main concept
of designing the spatial divi-
sion of the building: instead
of an arbitrary devising line
translated into a straight wall,
the two neighbors are forced
to live spatially with their de-
mands and wishes, within the
borders of a box. The resulting
meandering party wall gives the
special character and originality
of this villa.
Andrew Ticle
getting neighbourly passive massing vs.
INTRODUCTION
Utrecht double house is designed by the Netherlands architect group MvRdV at the site by the Utrecht
city park. The original buyer didnt mean to or need to have whole ground he bought, so that they looked
for partner to take over one-third of space. And it became the original idea of site design. According
to their wishes of space usage, instead of traditional straight wall divided two dwellings in one site, two
neighbors had space intersection to ft their need in space, and their wishes are the main concepts of
space transformation [1]. As shown in fgure 1, original buyer owns the larger part of building, which is
white part, and partner owns the smaller part of building, which is shaded part.
SITE / FLOOR PLAN
Basically, as in fgure 2, double house is a platonic solid cubic shape with a small part of subtractive form
at bottom-right corner. The shape is not completely cubic due to the relationship of site and its neighbor
houses. Two sides of neighbors are not parallel to each other and double house can extend its border of
box to as closed as to the right side of neighbor. As shown in fgure 3, site plan are arranged along with
two sides of border of neighbor houses, so that it made the shape of oblong. In foor plan, as in fgure
4 through a to e, layout of two family spaces consistently arranged at left and right but different size of
layout in each foor. Ground site only use two-thirds of intended foor plan, and two families share equally.
Up to frst foor most of spaces are arranged as living room space to larger family. On the contrary,
smaller family has living room space on most of second foor. The space ratio for two families at third foor
switch back again that larger family has larger space. Generally, the ratio of total foor plan is also one-
third to two-thirds, which as their shares of ground site.
FAADE / FENESTRATION
About the fenestration of double house, most of public spaces have large window facing front and
back. Only private space such as bathroom and bedroom have bear wall cover inner space. As foor
plan design, represented in fgure 5, the bedrooms for larger family are arranged at the second foor; the
bedrooms, bathroom, storage are
arranged at the frst foor, third foor and forth foor, so that these area are shaded in building faade. As
the concept of Nolli map, public space are open and white as fgure void, and private space are shaded
as fgure object. The purpose to set the large window facing front and back is because its site is by the
city park and the frontal of building is facing the park. Larger window offers better view for both dwellings
[2] and both families has equal view from their living room and dining room. Two dwellings have their own
entrances: one is at front and the other is at side. Though they have their own space in the house, they
have to share exterior space: garden [3].
TRANSFORMATION
The zigzagging partition is not come from nowhere. Each of space interlocking in two dwellings is been
calculated precisely to meet the initial ratio of space arrangement of one-third to two-thirds. Architects
try to use interlock approach to obtain more living spaces stretch across the entire width of the site. As
transformed in fgure 6 [2], initial division of two families is subject to the proportion. Then space trading
is made in following transformation that upper left block is moved to bottom center. After the frst attempt
to rearrange two spaces, smaller block exchange is considered at the second transformation. Because
of the disadvantage of top two blocks exchange lead one family to lost top foor and roof space, another
attempt is made to keep roof. But third transformation also cause the result that one dwelling only has
useful space centralized at the third foor. Newer compromise approach is only change more smaller
blocks from bottom-left toupper-right. It leads the fnal sketch model as shown as the diagram in bottom-
left at fgure 6. After main shape is obtained, few specifc blocks swap between two dwellings to balance
the private shaded parts in elevation. At the fnal transformation we can see that whole interlocking
spaces are asymmetric, even no partial symmetry.
TYPOLOGY
General speaking both sides of dwelling have linear organization along with the staircase
bottom-up. Assuming there is a plane formed by y-axis and z-axis, all living spaces
can be reached with shortest distance from central plane, and each foor can easily
intercommunicate to each other through central plane. To analyze more detailed about
organization of house, exploded diagram can be applied not only for organization, but can
also help understand about building structure. As demonstrated in fgure 8, the
massive wall on the side of building provides structure and organization. Two staircases in
dwellings also represent the main axis of building circulation [4].
STRUCTURE
Double house has special zigzag- ging partition structure hanging the living spaces and
private spaces like bedrooms and bathrooms in the air without column structure support.
The mechanical support and construction procedure must be designed carefully. In double
house component model which is built by Illinois Institute of Technology demonstrated the
procedure and mechanical design [5]. Shown in eight step model in fgure 9 through a to
h, site model is the frst one, then at the second step model in fgure 9b main walls go up
at two edges of site. Dividing walls in fgure 9c is the frst and main structure challenge
in the project that only two walls at the ground foor support whole 4 foors. In fgure 9d,
small box of bedrooms hang on two sides of edge walls with only support from walls. The
gravity and bad equilibrium points might cause the structure problem as shown in fgure
10. In diagram the blue part are the support of component, and the orange part are the
possible collapse point in each box and each turn on the dividing wall. In component
model and diagram shows the potential mechanical problem but it may have been fxed
by stronger material such as steel frame structure. Those are the information which can
not be presented in diagram. In fgure 9e, the construction kept going to install groups of
small spaces such as bathroom and closet. By now most of the living space is shaped.
In fgure 9f, vertical circulation is formed by installing the staircase in both dwellings. After
roof, windows, and few small walls are done, the project was complete. Actually the
structure has its own design of mechanical balance. In fgure 11a to c [1], a simple design
of diagonal frame across different plane from one edge to another distributes the force and
weight from top to the ground, which can be seen in fgure 12.

Because of the design of cross frame structure, force not only distributes horizontally and
vertically, but also goes diagonally to prevent the structure failure from enormous force
gather in one week point. A triangular mechanical structure is formed in fgure 11a, so that
the main support to smaller dwelling is reply on this triangular distribution design. The main
support to larger dwelling is shown in fgure 11b. A column in driveway provides important
support to right part of structure. The force is shifting from center to side and distribute the
force to two ways to both center support and side support. In fgure 11c, the support from
edge walls and dividing wall distribute the force vertically. Combining these three distribution
design any force from any place in the house can successfully relay to the ground either go
vertically, horizontally, and diagonally. These cross frame structure complement the week of
last force distribution design and its disadvantage shown in fgure 10.
Sishe Chin
Models, digital (top) and physical (bottom), Sul Ram Han
Pg.1 http://digilander.libero.it/studiolenci/Ricerche/0%20
linguaggi1.htm and http://www.foornature.com/progetto.
php?id=4374&sez=30
Pg.2 http://www.mvrdv.nl/#/offce
Pg.3 http://www.biotope-city.net/artikelen%20editie1/english/
Mastenbroek_eng.htm and http://www.search.nl/
Pg.4 http://digilander.libero.it/studiolenci/Ricerche/0%20lin-
guaggi1.htm
Pg.5-9 Levene, Richard C. MvRdV 1991-1997: Casa Doble
en Utrecht. El Croquis 86 (1997): 122-133.
Pg.10 http://www.fickr.com/photos/thom_mckenzie/
Pg.11 http://www.foornature.com/progetto.
php?id=4374&sez=30
Pg.12-13 Levene, Richard C. MvRdV 1991-1997: Casa
Doble en Utrecht. El Croquis 86 (1997): 122-133.
Pg.14-15 http://www.foornature.com/progetto.
php?id=4374&sez=30 and http://www.fickr.com/photos/
thom_mckenzie/
Pg.16-17 http://www.galinsky.com/buildings/twofamilyhouse/
Pg.18-19 http://old.arch.ethz.ch/moere/mvrdv/index.html
Pg.20-23 http://pds8.egloos.com/pds/200803/24/74/dou-
blehouse.pdf
Pg.24 https://www.csupomona.edu/~srhan/2008/06/
mvrdv-double-house.html
Pg.25 Levene, Richard C. MvRdV 1991-1997: Casa Doble
en Utrecht. El Croquis 86 (1997): 122-133.
Sources