Museum van Bommel van Dam moved to the former post office at the Keulsepoort in the historic city of Venlo in the Netherlands. The national monument has been fully renovated, with BiermanHenket responsible for the design of the new modern art museum.
FRONT (formerly StoneCycling) founders Tom van Soest and Ward Massa were both born and raised in the city of Venlo. They met the architect at WasteBuild in Amsterdam at the beginning of the design process. BiermanHenket showed great interest in our glazed brick slips made in partnership with Daria Biryukova of Studio Mixtura. We are proud to announce our collaboration on a part of the interior wall cladding for this project.
In this redevelopment, great value is attached to the preservation of the monumental features. All new systems and products used during the renovation are sustainable and circular.
Completed, 2021
BiermanHenket challenged FRONT® (formerly StoneCycling) to make a bespoke product for the historical building by upcycling local waste streams. The architect’s intention was not only to design a beautiful and functioning museum building but also to let the new function of this building be an impulse for the city.
Museum van Bommel van Dam was housed in a building designed by Jos van Hest in the Juliana Park of Venlo from 1971 to 2017. The “Keulse Poort” Main Post Office, to which the museum has now moved, was built in 1938 according to a design by Chief Government Architect Hayo Hoekstra.
The traditionalist style of the building has been maintained in the new plans. However, the terrace facade has been made more transparent. A new “periscope” on the roof offers a view of the city, and the roof of the bulge on the side is now also accessible to the public.
After the renovation, Museum van Bommel van Dam has more than two thousand square metres of depot, studio, public and exhibition space at its disposal. A museum café and shop have been built on the ground floor. Here, FRONT sustainable materials are used as bar and shop counter cladding.
Venlo-based glass recycling company Scheuten delivered a local waste stream of recycled glass for use as glazing on top of the custom glazed bricks.
Quarrying is a destructive industry to the environment. It has a direct impact on the landscape by leaving tonnes of unused waste material. We aim to find aesthetic, colourful applications for these types of waste streams, as well as using waste from local ceramic manufacturers.
Glazed bricks have long been on our minds. We’re already fond of our Shine series, the Truffle and Wasabi. The special top layer that we developed from recycled materials is a real eye-catcher for the façade or interior wall cladding.
That’s why we decided to expand our Shine collection with a series of innovative and unique waste-based glazes. And since we believe in the strength of collaboration with industry specialists, we teamed up with Studio Mixtura, one of the most exciting new experts in this field.
During research and development, we worked with ABO Global and used metallurgical by-products that usually have limited reuse. Within this project, Studio Mixtura provides the knowledge of an alchemist to further develop the extensive research for large-scale application of the glazes on our sustainable WasteBasedBricks and WasteBasedSlips.
As a city government we are ambitious on sustainability and finding ways to reuse what is already there. When we were looking for some powerful local partners, we were lucky to meet up with FRONT (formerly StoneCycling) founders Tom and Ward, both born and raised in the city of Venlo. The materials, partners and products that we chose for the newly renovated museum in the heart of the city have a high sustainable standard and a beautiful local presence.
As sustainability is at the core of our office, we intend to design with materials that come with their own natural colour without artificial applications. The absence of added colourings and paint brings us a very natural and unique material palette. We enjoyed co-creating with FRONT (formerly StoneCycling) and developing a unique product with a low carbon footprint, based on regionally collected waste.
The unique, natural and sustainable products of StoneCycling are not only aesthetically well suited to the van Bommel van Dam museum but also to our aim to be a museum that makes a significant contribution to a healthy, social, clean and fair world. The combination of the architect’s design with the materials from FRONT (formerly StoneCycling) makes for a real eye-catcher in the new museum!
This was a one-off product made specifically for this project. We developed the unique top layer from recycled materials in collaboration with Studio Mixtura. With our Custom Made Service, it's possible to develop your own bespoke brick or brick slip.
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