Talking Impact: ATELIERFRONT Design Studio
Thomas Buijs and Marita Bijlsma from ATERLIERFRONT.
Who are you?
We are Thomas Buijs and Marita Bijlsma of ATELIERFRONT. ATELIERFRONT is a young and ambitious architectural and interior design firm that was founded in 2018. We work on a wide range of projects varying from a new gibbon house in ARTIS, houses for human beings, office interiors and school renovations such as the JK building design for REC-Impact.
What's the impact of your work?
In every project we have couple of objectives focused on making an impact. First, we want our projects to be the expression of a story: the story of the buildings’ users and the buildings’ site.
To do this we have developed an inside-out design approach that is focused on user experience. We try to get a really good idea of the sense of place and translate that into our new design.
The end result should be a project that is both characterful and useable - a building that blends in and stands out at the same time. We focus on sustainability and circularity to make sure we reduce our designs to their most durable form.
Do you have entrepreneurial plans such as creating spaces for startups and growing ATELIERFRONT?
We have just moved to a larger office space to facilitate our own growth. We know what it feels like to start an office from scratch and we are in the middle of the experience of growing it. We are a small atelier with a broad network of partners. This enables us to quickly adapt and fit our expertise to a project.
Thinking about a startup space we would like to bring that feeling along to J/K at REC: the feeling of a strong networking experience that has everything in close vicinity to help companies in the startup phase achieve their goals.
What are your ideas for the J/K Building to tie in to the promise of REC-Impact?
REC J/K is an interesting and much overlooked building in the heart of the Roeterseiland campus. Its old lab facilities in the lower part of the building provide generous spaces right at the waterfront that are hardly being used. By creating a new entrance to the entire building on the waterfront with a central coffee bar where everyone can meet we really turn the waterfront into a new hotspot. We connect this new entrance directly to the new REC-Impact facilities. This will really bring life into this building. We will turn it into a thriving site where students, teachers and external partners can find each other and meet up for co-creation, social innovation and entrepreneurship.
The J/K building at REC. (Image: Christa Romp)
What's valorization for you?
We see valorization as the process of testing an idea for societal or entrepreneurial relevance, from dream to reality. It would be awesome to see people put their ideas to the test within the new REC impact community.
Where can we meet you?
You can find us in our new office in The Hague, but we are also planning to spend a series of open hours in the REC J/K building during summertime to explain our progress, but also to meet up with some of you to see how together we can further improve the design for the impact space.