Architecture of the interior. MVRDV: Villa VPRO
published in: Archis (1997) 5, pp 9-21; translation: John Rudge

"This summer the VPRO broadcasting organization is due to move from the ten villas it now occupies on 's-Gravelandseweg in Hilversum to new premises in the grounds of the NOB complex. Its new home is a single large building with floor space of some 10,000 m2 designed by the firm of MVRDV. How do you entice 350 members of staff of the country's most iconoclastic broadcasting company out of their present villa digs into a new concrete behemoth? How do you ensure they will all find their own niche there?
In late September 1996, during a tour (read climb) of what was then the half-finished carcass, Winy Maas of MVRDV spoke of 'a building without an outer facade, one that is all interior'; 'actually it's just six folded floor areas', 'a building with a built-in horizon', 'an unbroken hilly landscape with buildings in it' with 'the ambience of a luxury parking garage'. Maas was absolutely convinced that the completion date - some six months ahead - would be met because 'when the carcass is finished the building will in fact be ready'. This building, to be known as Villa VPRO, raises in no mean fashion the question of the relationship between 'architecture' and 'interior design'. [...]

Six folded floor areas
[...]

Built-in horizon
[...]

Wandering through a hilly landscape
[...]

A luxury parking garage
[...]

Reception area
[...]

Office stations
[...]

Soundproof cells
[...]

'Off-line' cells and studios
[...]

Fireplace
[...] The whole building is awash with such distinctive spaces which - unlike a 'less is more' prescription - can be used in more ways than one and may well generate or become the setting for new programmes, just as the VPRO has used its villas in the past. This building underpins those things that could be anticipated and provokes others than have yet to come. From villas to the Villa is really just a small step. "

© Guus Vreeburg / Het OOG, Rotterdam; 970330

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PS: While this text was being written and published, Villa VPRO was still very much under construction - as was evidenced by the accompanying photo's by Hans Werlemann. Once having been completed - right on schedule! - and occupied during the summer of 1997, the Archis issue of September 1997 published a series of new photo's by Leo van Velzen and Hans Werleman as "an impression of the finished work".