Media Plaza - Utrecht, Netherlands (May 1997)Designed by Sander Architecten “Media Plaza
Media Plaza - Utrecht, Netherlands (May 1997)Designed by Sander Architecten “Media Plaza is a futuristic government information centre in Utrecht aimed at making senior decision-makers in Dutch industry more aware of the importance of the information superhighway. Designed by Ellen Sander of Sander Architecten, its purpose is to take managers out of their every-day working lives and encourage them to stop and think about the technologies of the future. Media Plaza’s location in a small hall within the extensive and rather unattractive Jaarbeurs trade-fair complex made it imperative that the interior should deliver an out-of-this-world experience, and that is precisely what Sander has achieved. Industrialists enter the showcase by walking through a giant tube clad with stainless-steel mesh. Its laminated glass-bridge walkway is lit from below by glass fibre cables. This is not a passage entered lightly, and it gives a sense of encountering a different future. The tube leads visitors into a great hall in which there is a deliberate sense of movement achieved with running neon in the flooring, shifting lights, and a stainless-steel ceiling shifting slowly through space in a wave. Even the toilet block is an experience in itself, as glass elements, stainless-steel washbasins, internet screens set into the floor and water reflections on the wall indicate that this is no ordinary corporate office facility. The technical nerve centre of Media Plaza is a sculptural ‘highway shuttle’ designed to accommodate business presentations to small groups (20 people maximum). The idea is of a space shuttle making a quick trip to another galaxy. Visitors emerge from the shuttle to encounter a virtual marketplace offering hands-on display of the wares of the electronic superhighway within 'cells’ of stretched transparent rubber. An oval-shaped skybar with padded walls of blood-red velvet provides a sanctuary to relax in after the exertions of the imagination. This is a scheme that pushes hard at the spatial and technological boundaries in a bid to open minds to new opportunities. As Ellen Sander argues, 'architecture is not a way of building, but a way of thinking.”Scanned from International Interiors 7 (2000) -- source link