Jeugdsite, Knokke-Heist

The former fishing school of Heist, its garden and the adjacent villa together form a protected village view, leaving very little room for the extensive programme of the new youth site (youth service, Chiro, the music school, a toy and bicycle library and offices). Rather than adding space on top of the school, we propose two very compact ‘little towers’ on either side of the existing building: a play tower and an office tower. This preserves the highly characteristic silhouette of the fishing school, built on the metaphor of a ship.

The play tower is given a large outdoor terrace and an outdoor staircase, adding playfulness and expression to an otherwise rational volume. This outdoor circulation allows the youth movement to operate independently from the rest of the building and creates a direct link with the surrounding park.

The park is conceived as a concentric model in which density and openness alternate, separating active play from a calm park experience while preserving the character of the villa garden: sightlines, lawn, orchard and hay meadows. A ha-ha creates a seemingly endless lawn between the villa terrace and the playground. Paving is reduced, some 1,000 m² of existing tiles are reused in new surfaces and play elements, and rainwater is buffered on site in wadis.

Phase: competition
Client: Municipality of Knokke-Heist
Team: Carton123 architecten, a multitude, Plant en Houtgoed (landscape), Meow Collective (participation), Sileghem & Partners (structural engineer), Stabico-Stir (building services engineer)
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