The canal of Eindhoven is being transformed from an industrial zone into a blue-green urban axis for living and working. At the harbour head, we are realising a 70m residential tower comprising 100% social housing. The Picustoren – meaning Picus tower – is not just a landmark, it is a paragon for high-rise community buildings: a place to meet, firmly anchored within its surroundings.

Building upon a legacy

As early as 2006, diederendirrix established the urban plan that frames the transformation of the Picus NRE site at the harbor head. We realized a new waterfront park and the Picuskade residential ensemble around the DAF Museum. The adjacent NRE-site has since been redeveloped into a communal courtyard under the direction of urban designer Tom van Tuijn through a bottom-up approach. Picustoren is the keystone of this area’s development, positioned on the border of the waterfront park and the yard.

Collaborating for inclusivity

A tight-knit community has developed at the Picus NRE site, made up of residents, entrepreneurs from the new creative industry, restaurants and other venues. This community is actively involved in the project. The approach is twofold: integrating the Picustoren into the neighborhood, and making the neighborhood part of the Picustoren. We achieve this by working with a advisory panel – including client Wooninc., co-creator Zeewaardig, landscape architect Buro Bol, local residents and future tenants – to equip the new development with spaces that support both the residents’ and neighbors everyday needs. Three communal spaces are placed at the entrances which can function, for example, as a community living room, laundrette, workshop, play area or exhibition space.

Coming home to a community

The large and growing share of single-person households in our cities makes fostering a sense of community an essential part of any residential development. Our architecture encourages appropriation and social interaction. Picustoren promotes social cohesion across multiple scales: the city, the neighborhood, the building and the hallway. Within the landscape, the building plinth, the rooftop garden, and around the elevators, we design both formal and informal meeting spaces, carefully attuned to the degree of publicness or intimacy.

Layered architecture

Toward the city, the Picustoren presents itself in three ways. Its architecture references the site’s industrial past, it connects the waterfront park to the yard, and introduces distinct qualities of high-rise living to the area.

The low-rise volume, which softens the transition in scale from tower to yard, is articulated in metal atop a brick plinth, referencing the site’s industrial heritage. The plinth unifies the ensemble and activates the yard through large transparent facades. A generous gently sloping stair, set within greenery, bridges the level difference toward the waterfront, where the plinth seamlessly merges with the park.

The tower marks the harbor head with a cascading arrangement of balconies along its south-facing facade, overlooking the canal. It is conceived as a red brick sculpture of stacked volumes, responding to the varying building heights in its surroundings. At each level, distinct window types are introduced: French balconies opening toward the yard, deep window sills designed for sitting above the roof garden, and expressive bay windows that celebrate unobstructed views in the top of the tower. These variations in the facade enrich the diversity of houding types.

From ambition to quality

The project’s prominent location in the city comes with a high level of ambition, while affordable living remains the primary focus. To guide decision-making throughout the design process, we defined the project’s (soft) values in advance through five key objectives. We refer to these as a Program of Impact, ensuring qualitative ambitions are safeguarded alongside the spatial and technical Program of Requirements.

In this way, we realize a distinctive ensemble on a compact and complex site, offering a rich variety of affordable apartments. Not as anonymous high-rise, but as part of a community.