Best Western Plus, Amstelveen | Luxury metal exterior shell

The Best Western Plus hotel in Amstelveen is located in the Legmeer business park, which will be redeveloped in the coming years into a mixed urban live/work area.  Initially, the hotel had an office use. However, due to the crisis, the area was struggling with a lot of vacancy. Reason for the project developer to transform the existing building and the planned new construction into a hotel. Salient detail: the construction of the office had already started. It was up to Just Architects to give a different twist to the initial concept during implementation, but still fit into its surroundings with predominantly buildings with a metal outer shell.

The design was dictated by the existing office building with a limited floor height, begins Walter Hendriks of Just Architects. "The original design of the new building was grafted on an office function. After the foundation, basement and first floor were poured, the plans were changed. Instead of an office function, the complex was to have a hotel function. Moreover, an additional floor was desirable to provide more rooms for profitable operation of the hotel. And that while the entire substructure had been realized. This fact dictated the principles in terms of design and weight."

Light facade construction

Hendriks had his eye on a possible façade construction with Kingspan Insulated Panels at an earlier stage to make the building fit in with its surroundings. "The new situation with an extra floor required the lightest possible facade construction. A good starting point to come up with a suitable interpretation together with Kingspan. Ultimately, the KS 600 Evolution QuadCore panels were chosen in a spectrum of three different colors: Silver - Obsidian - Beigestone. This is a high-quality aesthetic flat panel, without the characteristic ribbed structure. In terms of use of materials, this allows us to neatly match the buildings in the area, but in terms of appearance, the new hotel really does rise above it with its luxurious-looking metal exterior shell."

All detailing was jointly designed and technically checked to achieve the intended aesthetically pleasing appearance.

Detailing

Kingspan, client De Heemraad Ontwikkeling and Just Architects spent a lot of time together on the detailing. "The dimensions were quite a challenge," Hendriks knows. "The facade was designed on a vertical grid of 0.6 meters with staggered windows per floor. The ability to accommodate dimensional tolerances was very limited." All detailing was jointly designed and technically checked to achieve the intended aesthetically high-quality appearance, adds Patrick Theelen of Kingspan. "Special attention was paid to the exact alignment of the various panel seams on top of each other and the incorporation of the window frames. In addition, the flashing was all done in thicker aluminum: 2 millimeters instead of the usual 0.75 millimeters. Some of the KS 600 Evolution QuadCore panels are also FIREsafe fire-resistant and have FM Approval 4880 and 4881."

The result of the joint efforts is impressive. The Best Western Plus hotel in Amstelveen is a true eye-catcher in its surroundings.