BioPartner 5
Finalist Dutch Design Awards 2021 – category Best Commissioning
BioPartner 5 at the Leiden Bio Science Park is the first Paris Proof building in the Netherlands, according to calculations by the Dutch Green Building Council and NIBE. Popma ter Steege Architecten (PTSA) designed the business centre with offices, laboratories and meeting facilities as a meeting place for the campus. High-tech and low-tech come together here. High-quality research areas with energy-neutral building installations go hand in hand with large-scale reuse.
For example, the steel structure from the nearby Gorleaus laboratory has been inventively dismantled and reused as a demountable main supporting structure. The robust steel has been applied as a visible structure and gives character to the new building in which the history of the famous laboratory is continued. The robust steel was used as a visible structure and gives character to the new building, in which the history of the famous laboratory is continued.
Debris from the same building is used to design a low-tech green façade, which firmly connects the building to the ground level and is a soil for diverse indigenous vegetation. Planting is continued around the building like a small ecosystem, fed by collected rainwater.
In order to create an aesthetic, circular environment, PTSA has closely involved various design press in the process, such as Studio RENS and Catalogtree. BioPartner 5 shows how many building materials, already used to good effect, can be given a second life. From the completely reused steel supporting structure to the internal walls, from the floor finish to the toilets.
Popma ter Steege Architecten (PTSA) has twice been a finalist in the Best Commissioning category of the Dutch Design Awards 2021. Both BioPartner 5, the first ‘Paris Proof’ building in the Netherlands designed by PTSA, and the Circulair Warenhuis have been nominated.
Photography: Rene de Wit