Kwakelkade in Alkmaar

The Kwakelkade project is a mid-rise mixed-use complex with approximately 20 apartments and commercial use on the ground floor and an underground parking garage. Sketcho was engaged by BBRH to work with the architect and structural engineer on the design, model and development of the architectural drawings for the project. With Sketcho’s insights into building installation, the team was able to take into account downstream requirements and include them in advance in the early architectural drawings.
Type
Residential function (residential)
Location
Alkmaar, Netherlands
Status
Building application
Client
Bouwburo rood-hart

Design in Details

In design, we bring characteristics of the natural world into built spaces, such as water, greenery, and natural light, or elements like wood and stone. Encouraging the use of natural systems and processes in design allows for exposure to nature, and in turn, these design approaches improve health and wellbeing. There are a number of possible benefits, including reduced heart rate variability and pulse rates, decreased blood pressure, and increased activity in our nervous systems, to name a few.

Over time, our connections to the natural world diverged in parallel with technological developments. Advances in the 19th and 20th centuries fundamentally changed how people interact with nature. Sheltered from the elements, we spent more and more time indoors. Today, the majority of people spend almost 80-90% of their time indoors, moving between their homes and workplaces. As interior designers embrace biophilia.

Incredible Result

Establishing multi-sensory experiences, we can design interiors that resonate across ages and demographics. These rooms and spaces connects us to nature as a proven way to inspire us, boost our productivity, and create greater well-being. Beyond these benefits, by reducing stress and enhancing creativity, we can also expedite healing. In our increasingly urbanized cities, biophilia advocates a more humanistic approach to design. The result is biophilic interiors that celebrate how we live, work and learn with nature. The term translates to ‘the love of living things’ in ancient Greek (philia = the love of / inclination towards), and was used by German-born American psychoanalyst Erich Fromm in The Anatomy of Human Destru ctiveness (1973).