Part I: Andrew Beck

Today we left Maastricht early in the morning and headed back to Eindhoven. Whereas last time we spent our day in the city, today we walked into the outskirts of town. After getting a little bit lost, we found our way to a beautiful country estate. Although the estate that we were visiting was built in the 1930s, the land has been developed over centuries and has housed a number of different buildings and been utilized for multiple purposes. Most notably, the property historically had a nunnery.

In its current state, the property contains an ornate home, a converted carriage house, and a small barn. Like many of the estates in the area, there is an interest to preserve the heritage of the land and homes. Unfortunately, as agriculture has become industrialized, these estates lack the traditional means to support the associated costs of upkeep. Consequently, the estates are transitioning towards new identities as public spaces in order to monetize the land to pay for their preservation.

The owners of the estate asked us to help them come up with creative ways to revitalize and reimagine their space. We split into small groups and were given about two hours to ideate and draw before presenting our designs and suggestions.

Part II: Jiangchen Zhu

After the intense design process, or more like a design challenge, we present to the owner of the property.

One of the design solutions the first group talked about is how to frame the vista more intentionally to create stronger visual connection. The second group focused on creating a transition from wetland environment to hybrid landscape then to a new designed rose garden. The third group interested on water fluctuate and existing structures to create new  landscape. The final group focused on special quality of the site and divide the landscape to separate rooms and develop them to 21st century gardens.

Based on the feedback from the owners, the presentation was successful, we provide new perspectives to the clients. If we have a longer time, there were things we could elaborate further, the large picture of the design, the water change, connection to the larger landscape, how to uniform the designs together to let them talk the same language.

Overall, The design exercise was intense, interesting and informative.

Then the highlights of the day was the presentation from the design firm Croonenburo 5. One of the project at Panama City, Canal De Panama project mentioned length of 2600 feet lock for large vessel. The waterfront development at Antwerpen, Belgium. Then the 16 story apartment and the roof garden at the design school. The indoor skate park named area 51 was the highlight of the highlights in the day.