Residential tower – Amersfoort, Netherlands
 
This twenty-storey residential tower is both a compact and eminently rational building, and an urban signal marking the entrance to a district under development – Die Neuwe Stadt (The New City). To perform this signalling function, the tower’s facade is characterised by a series of devices that vary according to the orientations. On the western side run long balconies, punctuated in the background by oversized downspouts that could be mistaken for poles. To the south and west , the facades are distinguished by circular terraces with edges marked by low planters that vary in their plantings from one floor to the next. They are attached to a central post that runs through each of them like an immense metal skewer. The water systems needed for the planters are exposed and give the building the misleading appearance of high-tech architecture. To the north, the facade is entirely flat, like a mask, marked only by the undulation of the galvanised steel cladding and the streaks of the black slabs. On the roof of the tower stands a sign showing the name of the district and a pivoting crane for maintaining the facades.