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Amsterdam city magConcept Development

The creative city

Z26B | 2 April 2015

Case studyWibautstraat

Contents

Concept Development Z26B | Wibautstraat 2

Amsterdam: the creative city

4. The creative city6. Concept of creativity8. Amsterdam as a creative city

Case study Wibaut-straat

10. Case study: Wibautstraat12. From urban failure to stu-

dent hotspot16.Redevelopment Parooltoren

& Trouwgebouw17. Student Hotel19. Amstelcampus21. Volkshotel

Prognosis

23. Prognosis

TeamClaire Cesareo

Christina HamayonJarmo van der Heul

Kasif Kivrak

ContributorRobert Simon

8 16 23

Concept Development Z26B | Wibautstraat3

Welcome

Welcome to the first issue of Amsterdam city mag, thedefinitive guide to the creative city Amsterdam. Amste

dam, a cosmopolitan village and creative capital, has beenranked as one of the top cities in the world based on the

three Ts of economic development: tolerance, talent andtechnology. With its historic city centre and Canal Ringon the UNESCO World Heritage List, Amsterdam is adaily source of inspiration for the many creatives that

work here. Its liberal, tolerant and free-spirited reputation attracts talent from all over the world,

making it one of the worlds most multicultural cities anda great place for bringing your ideas to life. So its no

wonder that Amsterdam is home to many creative industries such as advertising, TV, music, app

development and gaming. Amsterdam is also home tosome of the worlds leading advertising companies andthe city has also emerged as a leading location for the

development of television formats.So you can imagine there is a lot going on in Amsterdam,

monthly we want to highlight a (future) hotspot in Amsterdam. This month we will highlight the

Wibautstraat. This street is a very interesting case because it used to be an urban failure, but is now really becom-ing a student hotspot. In this issue of Amsterdam city

mag you can read all the ins and outs of the Wibautstraat!

Welcome



The creative cityWhy do you live in this city rather than another? The answer is never simple. Thesuccess of a city is never the same combination. Geographer Richard Florida hasfound success by trying to conceptualize the phenomenon that he called the Creative City. He considers that a city is creative if it interweaves in the best possible way with the three Ts (Technology, Talent and Tolerance), based onthe three components of the creative class: passionate advanced technology, the bohemians (or artists who express the talent in its diversity) andhomosexual people (which provide a high degree of tolerance). Floridas theoriesare the source of both praise and controversy. Floridas ideas have been criticizedfrom a variety of political perspectives and by both academics and journalists. Butthere are also a lot of people that praise Floridas work, and the fact that Floridahas added a fourth T (for territory, emphasizing the importance of naturaldata), was a worldwide success. Many cities have taken over this approach to feedtheir urban marketing and, more specifically, their development projects. With a purpose:progress in international and national rankings of cities.

The creative city, its concepts and usesBut Richard Florida wasnt the only important person concerning the conceptof creative cities. The concept of the creative city was actually developed by urbanist Charles Landry, And has since become a global movement reflecting anew planning paradigm for cities. During the 1980s, Charles became known because of his book The Creative City: A Toolkit for urban innovators.

According to Charles Landry the philosophy of a creative city is that there isalways more creative potential in a place. It posits that conditions need to be created for people to think, plan and act with imagination in harnessing opportunities or addressing seemingly intractable urban problems. He says thatthere are seven groups of factors involved in this concept: creative, quality of management, the diversity of talent, openness, intensity of local identity, qualityof urban facilities and opportunities for networking. In short, the creative city is a territorial development model, a kind of label to attract investors. The creativeclass would gather about 30% of the workforce. According to Richard Florida, thecreative class workers are first attracted to creative places and then jobs are created, not the reverse. The creative interaction becomes the engine of thegrowth of cities.



Every single human being is creative. The biggest challenge of the creative age is to lift thebottom up and encourage a prosperous, vibrant and sustainable community for all.

-Richard Florida


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The concept of creativityCreativity is our new economy. We live in the greatest moment of economic transformation. According to Richard Florida, the thing that distinguishes human beings and bind us together intersubjective as a whole, is our shared human creativity. Creativity is an intersubjective in a social process.The Creative City describes a new method of strategic urban planning and examines how people can think, plan and act creatively in the city.

It explores how we can make our cities more liveable and vital by harnessing peoples imagination and talent. Our cities and communities are the social and economic organizing unit of the creative age. Place has become increas-ingly important. Communities and neighbourhoods have become more im-portant than in any other time in human history. Nowadays more than 50% of the entire population lives in cities in Urban Areas. In 2050 this number will be 70 %. Creativity has become a mantra of our age endowed almost ex-clusively with positive virtues.

The concept of creativity covers a very wide area of professional activity. In this concept, creativity cannot be limited only to the cultural and artistic fields. Also, among the many interpretations of the concept of the creative city, the art is assigned very different roles. What truly drives the growth of a creative city is Innovation. Innovation doesnt come from companies; it comes from communities, cities. If we want an economic and technological strategy in the future, it has to be rooted in rebuilding our cities.

Networks of towns were built around the understanding of culture as a cen-tral issue. For example, in 2004, UNESCO launched the Global Creative Cities Network, which, although based on the notion of the creative econo-my, focused on cultural or artistic fields and less on technological or finan-cial fields. On a national level, The Creative City Network of Canada also promotes a cultural approach to the concept. It is then a real overlap be-tween cultural and urban strategies shaping policies through this process of metropolization.

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But others give it a much more utilitarian significance. Culture and the arts then become promotional tools. Since the mid-1980s, local actors have de-veloped similar communication strategies with those companies to meet the criteria of international cities. The urban marketing has now become es-sential for local governments. Also city branding: branding an increasing property values.

area, a city or region to create a brand, as through slogans, I Amsterdam (Amsterdam) and Think London (London). In addition to creating an image and symbols, the instrumentalization of culture also revolves around a purely financial concept. Building a creative city is a major challenge to attract investment, encourage consumption and to create wealth. The creative class, easy and consumerist, is the origin of gentrification, which symbolizes any facet of urban renewal that inevita-bly leads to displacement of the occupying demographic. This is a common and widespread controversial topic and term in urban planning. It refers to shifts in an urban community lifestyle and an increasing share of wealthier residents and/or businesses and



Amsterdam as a Creative city

Amsterdam as a creative city



Amsterdam is home to a growing number of creative and knowledge workers, membersof the creative class. And the city is doing much to foster its most important economicasset: the creative power of multiculturalism. Amsterdam is considered a model for theintegrating power of an open, liberal society. Signs of this are the liberalization of marijuana consumption, the annual gay parade along the canals and the liberal immigration policy.

If we observe the position of local authorities with regard to the market, a city mustdetermine if it wants to let market forces or otherwise, correct it by letting the publicauthorities intervene to provide premises and equipment that will reduce operatingcosts. It is this later choice made by Broedplaats program in Amsterdam, which offerspreferential rent space for art projects.

The Bureau Broedplaatsen, keeps an eye out for vacant buildings like the VolkskrantHouse and subsidizes their upkeep. The city has already spent 50 million ($68 million)to help its creative class grow. And it is money that has been well spent. Of Amsterdams740,000 residents, 47.1 percent of those who are currently employed work in knowedge-intensive sectors. The growth rates within individual sectors are impressive. Eightthousand people work in the art business, and the creative services sector has created9,000 new jobs -- a third more than a decade before. Twelve thousand people work fulltime in the media sector, and a host of students serve as a talent reservoir.

In Amsterdam, the industrial areas on the periphery of city centers have found themselves at the heart of new initiatives: the transformation of old industrial buildingsinto arts or cultural facilities (museums, art galleries, libraries, artistic creation centersor nurseries creative businesses).

The reasons are well identified. Work with the former indeed offers new possibilities: theinterweaving of past and present, including the fabric again to economic use, allows thehistory and culture to operate simultaneously on several levels, especially when implementing a participatory approach to development.

An example of this phenomenon is the NDSM building north of Amsterdam, a giganticformer shipyard, which is now one of those creative hotspots where people look for practical experience and insights about the eternal struggle between chaos and structure,(cultural) self-organisation and (municipal) control. Once rehabilitated, these buildingsbecome centers of attraction for tourists, but also for artists and companies. Places ofwork and production, they have a symbolic and economic impact on an entire neighborhood. Another example is the Wibautstraat, once just a street where peoplepassed trough to get to the city center, now becoming a student hotspot with many facilities to attract students, expats and businesses.

Case study: Wibautstraat


Case study : WibautstraatThis week we highlight the Wibautstraat. This is a very inter-esting case because this street used to be just a regular street where people would just pass trough to get to the city centre, because there was nothing there to find. But nowadays Wibautstraat is a vibrant place with

loads of facilities for students and people who live there, and it doesnt end there. The student hotspot is growing bigger and bigger. The place will be more vibrant and attractive than ever with the Amstelcampus, the Volkshotel and the new student hotel, providing great living and rec-reational hotspots.

From urban failure For a long time Wibautstraat was seen as Amsterdams ugliest street. Originally, the train from Amsterdam to Utrecht would cut through this part of town. The surrounding neigbourhoods, separated by the railroad, were dotted with beer breweries and cheap houses for the working classes. In the 1930s, when the trains were redirected, the remaining open space was redesigned as an avenue. It was to rival the Champs lyses or Berlins Stalin-Allee and Kurfrstendamm. However, the street never lived up to these high expectations.





History of WibautstraatOriginally, in the late 19th and early 20th century, the train from Amsterdam to Utrecht would cut through this part of town. The surrounding neighbourhoods, separated by the railroad, were dotted with beer breweries and cheap houses for the working classes.

In the 1930s, when the trains were redirected and after the dem-olition of the tracks and the train station next to what is now Weesperplein, the remaining open space was redesigned as an avenue. It was to rival the Champs lyses in Paris or Berlins Stalin-Allee (now Karl-Marx-Allee) and Kurfrstendamm. How-ever, the street never lived up to these high expectations.

Alongside the four-lane thoroughfare emerged a real hodgepodge of architecture, from truly majestic to plain miserable. The street has created a heavily trafficked no mans land, creating a barrier between the prosperous Amstel River waterfront (Weesperzijde) and other neighbourhoods, like Oosterpark- and Transvaalbuurt, that are facing a mix of problems and gentrification.



Turning pointFor a long time nothing happened, no politician could ignite the long awaited regeneration of the street. Companies slowly aban-doned it, with only commuters filling the space, zipping past by car or subway. But in the last five years, thanks to bottom-up ini-tiatives by local entrepreneurs, the situation has turned around.

Originally slated for demolition to make way for luxury condo-miniums, the Trouw building was saved. Now, five years later, the street has changed dramatically. Nowadays during the week-ends, Baut and Volkshotel (and before TrouwAmsterdam) attract thousands of visitors.

An upmarket pop-up restaurant, Baut, opened next door, new apartments are being built along the street and the former Volk-skrant headquarters-turned-art-incubator has been converted into a creative hotel. Simultaneously, the neighbourhoods sur-rounding the street are in a process of gentrification.

The concrete Trouw Building forms an architectural anomaly. Its industrial rawness stands out in a city known for its elegant resi-dential brick-architecture.Together with the neighbouring Parool Tower it was designed by Dutch architects Van den Broek en Bakema in the late 60s to house the editorial offices of some of the countrys most import-ant newspapers.The two buildings sit at the heart of the so-called Parool Trian-gle.

While the Wibautstraat underwent a metamorphosis, the Trouw-building has remained largely untouched.After Trouw closed its doors at the end of last year, what will hap-pen next to the street and its surroundings?

To Student Hotspot Current Developments have changed the area dramatically new apartments are being built along the street and the former Volkskrant headquarters has been converted into a creative hotel. Simultaneously, the neighbourhoods surrounding the street are in a process of gentrification.





Redevelopment parooltoren & Trouwgebouw

Real Estate Developer Boelens de Gruyter has started the redevel-opment of the Trouwgebouw and Parooltoren on the Wibautstraat. The purchase and redevelopment of the buildings requires a total in-vestment of about 60 million. The buildings are redeveloped into a Student Hotel, with 573 rooms. In addition, 4,000 m2 is used for commercial purposes.

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Concept Development Z26B | Wibautstraat

The student hotel

In 2014 The Student Hotel received the International Award for Best Hotel Venues Concept. It is a fairly new concept in the Netherlands. As an interna-tional, local or exchange student you can rent a fully furnished room, where besides a bed also comes with a private bathroom, desk and sufficient storage space for textbooks.

The Student Hotel Amsterdam is much more than just a place to sleep. It com-bines the comfort, privacy, and quality you expect of a hotel with the fun and frolics you hope to find in a student house.

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The rooms include all the facilities that make your stay a pleasant one. All the guests benefit from free WiFi, study & work areas, lounges, an on-site gym, games room with ping-pong and billiard tables, free events and parties. The stylish bar-restaurant is open from 7am till midnight and serves affordable tasty food for breakfast lunch and din-ner

At The Student Hotel you benefit from a range of facili-ties and services to ensure that you will immediately feel at home so you can focus on the things that matter most to you. For example If you stay for more than 2 weeks at The Student Hotel Amsterdam you will receive your own bike to use during your stay designed exclusively for The Student Hotel by VANMOOF. Even though Amsterdam is already a pure cycling city, but even though the idea is great.

MULTI-PURPOSE SPACEBesides the Student Hotel, 4,000 m2 is used for com-mercial functions. After there will be enough space for business owners and Restaurants at the foot of the tower. Also currently is being examined whether there will be a club in the basement, replacing Club Trouw and also the possibilities of a sports club.

BenefitsStudent hotel facilitates homes to international students, The mix of races, genders and backgrounds could generate a flow of new ideas. The incredible community from over 46 different countries guarantees there is always some-thing fun going on while the private en-suite rooms ensure that you can get some quiet time when you need it too.

At The Student Hotel we want to help make your Amsterdam experience unique. The knowledgeable staff will be happy to share their hidden insights and we have on-site bikes available so that you can see the city like the locals do.

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Amstel CampusThe Parooltoren is located at a convenient and accessible location. Two import-ant key factors are the Amstel Campus and the Volkshotel.

With the Amstelcampus the HvA provides professional and forward looking educational facilities. In this area a total of 260 students residences will be delivered. In 2018 the Amstelcampus has approximately 30,000 students and staff. The Campus will definitely become an important factor in the social life of Amsterdam.

Amstel Campus is located on both sides of the Wibautstraat. The western part is the area between the Eerste Boerhaavestraat, Swammerdamstraat and Mau-ritskade. The eastern part is between the Mauritskade the Van Musschenbroek-straat and Tilanusstraat.

Due to its central location in the city, the Amstelcampus really will be a part of the city. Unlike other campuses, the Amstel Campus is open and accessible. Not only students, but also local residents and passers can make use of the facilities provided by the Campus.

In 2009 the development of the Amstelcampus started. Now six of the seven buildings that make up the campus are now ready to use: the Kohnstammhu-is, Theo Thijssenhuis, the Benno Premselahuis, The Koetsier Montaignehuis House, the Muller Lulofhuis en the Wibauthuis. Within the Kohnstammhoff you can find the HvA Studio, a creative hotbed of the HvA.

The student residences already have been put into use. The new part of educa-tion will be opened at the start of the academic year 2015/2016. For the latter to deliver Rhijnspoor building, the preparatory work is started in March 2015. According to the preliminary plan this will be ready in 2018. Then the Amstel Campus is fully deployed and 5 of the 7 educational domains will be clustered in Oost.

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The Volkshotel has opened its doors in April, literally across the street, which ever since provided a new creative space and a renovated club.

The Volkskrantgebouw (for many of you known as Doka or Canvas) hives a ho-tel, a club, a restaurant, Grand Caf, co workings spaces, a theater and cocktail bar and mini-spa with hot tubs on the roof including views over the entire cityThe basement where all the musicians were located, has been expanded with new studios for DJs and producers and

Canvas is currently re-built into a whole new, sound insulated, room. This in-creases the musical possibilities of Can-vas. For example international DJs make their appearance on the seventh floor, with a high-end sound systems.

Architect Steven Steenbruggen is one of the pillars of this large-scale renovated building. As well as interior designer Bas van Tol, who in the past has been responsible for the design of Trouw and Club 11.

Volkshotel

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On the seventh floor, Canvas has made a comeback with a doubled capacity and a 360 view of Amsterdam.

This floor is constantly moving from breakfast room to lunchroom, restau-rant, bar and club at the weekend.The Volkshotel has proved to be a fer-tilization of activities and people. By bringing together creative workspaces, hatchery, hospitality, art and a hotel, the Volkshotel has its own micro 24-hour culture.

The Wibautstraat is located in East Amsterdam and close to the lively neighbourhood of De Pijp, the mar-kets on Waterloo Square, the prosper-ous Amstel River waterfront and other neighbourhoods, like Oosterpark- and Transvaalbuurt. A diverse array of bars, restaurants, vintage and concept stores, creative meeting places can be found in these vibrant and diverse areas. These factors contribute to an attractive area for entrepreneurs, tourists, locals and students in the near future.

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Case study: Prognosis


PrognosisWhat will the Wibautstraat look like in 5 years? There a lot factors that need to be taken in consideration to give valid prognosis of the development of this area. For example, the HvA are currently working on an expansion of the Amstelcam-pus. There are currently working on the Atrium in the Rijnspoorgebouw. It has been said this building will be the most sustainable educational building in Hol-land. This building will give place to the domain Technique students of the HvA. The Amstelcampus was already working a lot on sustainability and this new building will add to that. Innovativeness is an aspect that the HvA thinks is very important and they are trying to motivate their students to be innovative during their studies.

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With the development of this building the HvA is giving a clear signal what they want to achieve with the Amstelcampus. Their main goal developing the Am-stelcampus has been to make the non-popular Wibautstraat into an education boulevard that will be well known in Holland and even on a global level. Our predications is that they will succeed in this mission. The combination of the buildings that are already in use and the ones that are being built will result in a big boost for the area in the next 5 years. These huge educational buildings will harvest at least 40.000 students and employees in 2018 and this number can only grow. Where will 40.000 students and employees be eating, hanging out, studying and most importantly spending money? Thats right, in the Wibaut-straat. The number of businesses and shops in and near the Wibautstraat has grown in the last couple of years and this number will continue to grow. During our interviews with people of local business they shared their motives for open-ing a shop in the Wibautstraat. A huge amount of people indicated that they did this because of revitalization of the neighborhood. Our expectation is that more companies and business will recognize the opportunity that is occurring in the Wibautstraat.



PrognosisAnother aspect that is important in this matter in this concept is the old image of the Wibautstraat in Amsterdam. Off course in a few years the place will be crawling with students but it is also im-portant to attract other target groups to this street.

The old image of the Wibautstraat was that it is a street with boring government buildings and metro stops that connect certain parts of the city with each other. Also the main road in the street people just used to get from A to B rather than making a stop to have drink or bite to eat. The surrounding neighborhoods the Pijp and a small part of Amsterdam East are much more popular with the locals.

For this to change it will be necessary that there are enough places for people to go to.

This is where the Volkshotel comes in. It plays an important role in attracting people other than students to this area. The companies who are located in this building are offering a variety of options and the popularity of this building is growing.

In the Volkshotel people can find work-ing spaces, a caf, a restaurant, a club and expositions. Also with the new Stu-denthotel just across the street we pre-dict that the Volkshotel will be a prom-inent and thriving location within the next 5 years.

The two buildings that will give place to the Studenthotel are the Parooltoren and Trouwgebouw. It is their purpose to offer a wide range of options to the stu-dents and locals.

They made plans for local busniness to set up shop there. BAUT is the first known restaurant to be located there. BAUT started as a pop-up restaurant but because of the enormous popularity they decided to offer them a permanent place in the building.

BAUT has a big attraction to locals and will this will result in more locals who will visit the street and spend their money there. Whilst in the area these locals will the rejuvenation of the area and will realize that this is the place to be. At least, thats what we expect.



In the same building there is place for shops, a club and a gym. The Studentho-tel will also bring a lot of international students to the area.

These students will bring their culture with them and they will share this with the local students. This fusion will re-sult in a group-and subculture that will affect the area.

Our prediction is that this fusion and huge amount of HvA buildings in the street will result in a certain student community in this street.

The number of places where they can meet each other will be huge and the HvA can play a big part in this.

By facilitating this interaction between students from around the world the HvA motivates students to come togeth-er and think about ways that will con-tribute to improvement of the area.

This continuing process will cause an effect of students that come together and present a united front so they can have something to say about their envi-ronment. Who would know better what to do with the area than the thousands of students that study and/or live here?

The creative individual is no longer viewed as an iconoclast. Heor she is the new mainstream. - Richard Florida

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