Tall & Urban News

Situated on a corner site adjacent to the Flemish Opera house, the Antwerp Tower is an existing office building that will be repurposed into a hybrid-programmed residential tower, reusing the existing building’s structure. Designed by Wiel Arets Architects (WAA), it is set to become one of the city’s tallest towers.

Extending the tower to 100 meters tall when completed, the development is set to cover 59,800 square meters. Antwerp Tower is part of a larger renovation of the area directly around its base known as the Keyserlei, the main pedestrian avenue that leads from Antwerp’s central train station into the center of the city.

The building, which originally housed offices and retail, was constructed in the early 1970s. The renovation entails extending the width of the marquise-diamond-like floorpan, increasing its height, and repurposing the space directly between the opera house and the tower to create a four-story plinth at the tower’s base, for cafés, wellness areas and a roof terrace.

In order to create living units largely free of columns, the original structure will be partially replaced by an alternating structural system of load bearing walls and columns. Each floor will contain six to 14 units, for a total of 290 luxury apartments when completed. Units are set to range in size from 40–120 square meters, with penthouses up to 240 square meters. A façade system of polished concrete components with a slightly golden hue will compose the building’s new façade. Up to 9 meters wide, these concrete components will minimize visual patterning on the façade when seen from afar or at street level. The same material extends to the building’s entrance lobby and the internal walls and ceilings.

Antwerp Tower will be located 300 meters from the city’s central train station.

For more on this story, go to Archinect.