In July, the University of Twente will start remodelling the ground floor of the current Drienerburght building. Up until the start of this year, Drienerburght was still being used as a conference hotel. That facility – the U Parkhotel – has now been relocated to the renovated Hogekamp building.
A detailed investigation showed that the vacated Drienerburght building is well suited to the educational and residential needs of ATLAS, the University of Twente’s University College. ATLAS is currently housed in the Citadel, on the O&O Square (Education and Research Square) on campus. ATLAS needs a varied range of teaching spaces, given it’s project-based education and personal supervision by the teachers, and there is an increasing need for additional accommodation for the College’s students on campus .
For these reasons, the university desires for some time already to find a more suitable location for ATLAS. The sense of community is a key feature of ATLAS, so it is important for the location to have suitable spaces for office and community functions. Drienerburght is ideally suited to these purposes and to ATLAS’s image. The building is located between the campus’s residential and recreational centre and the O&O Square and is also adjacent to the new residential area for the Hogekamp.
In the upcoming months, the building will be modified to suit ATLAS’s needs, so they can start using the building at the end of January 2020.
Drienerburght’s ground floor is being completely renovated. The building will be made more sustainable, and will be entirely natural-gas free. It will also use direct current (DC), to some extent. Many modern devices operate on direct current so, when they are plugged into an alternating current (AC) wall socket, the power has to be converted by an adapter (e.g. for a laptop). The advantage of a DC supply (compared to traditional AC power supplies) is that no DC conversion step is needed, so there is no corresponding loss of energy. The new type of power installation in the Drienerburght building renders this conversion step superfluous, thus saving energy.
Furthermore, the ground floor will be fitted out with completely new ceilings, floor coverings and wall coverings. A number of systems will be renewed and improved, and the characteristic skylights will be replaced by more sustainable, fire-resistant alternatives. On the outside, window frames will be repaired and, where necessary, window panes will be replaced. The building’s facade will be painted sky blue, to match the blue steps currently being built on Hogekamp Square.
Renovation work on the building will commence this coming October. The scheduled completion date is January 2020. Thereafter, relocation of ATLAS to the new building will take place.
For more information: https://www.utwente.nl/en/ltsh/
Do you have any questions about on-campus housing projects? Contact Bertyl Lankhaar, spokesperson of the Executive Board, tel.: +31 (0)53 489 2210
