Page 27 - ELEMENTS EUROPA (EN)

ELEMENTS EUROPA
Voluminous but slender, the canopy’s metal structure has
a glazed roof and two expanded metal facades rising up 8.20
metres. The openings in the expanded metal are designed to
allow natural light to pass through, while at the same time
preventing people outside from looking in. The facades extend
1.10m upwards above the canopy, acting as guardrails for
maintenance staff.
In front of the lobby, a “grid” covering half of the covered
surface hangs from the canopy, acting as a support for all
the lighting and communication equipment needed for the
press to cover the arrivals of heads of state. On both sides
of the entrance, wooden podiums fenced off with solid
galvanised steel guardrails are available for journalists. One of
the two podiums is directly linked with its counterpart inside
the building, allowing journalists to cover the whole entry
procedure.
The 2nd-floor walkway zigzags across the canopy’s structure,
with its glass louvre walls offering a view down onto arriving
heads of state.
The 6th-floor walkway is constructed the same way, but is
straight.
TO THE WEST AND SOUTH-WEST: BLOCK C OF THE RÉSIDENCE
PALACE
The work done on the semi-public space separating blocks A
and C of the Résidence Palace involved solely the refurbishment
of the pavement in the same material as all the other paving and
the installation of a row of bollards along the whole facade of the
Europa building, pending later improvements.
Through this form of juxtapositioning of the facades, the
contours and profiles of the two blocks, though by no means
identical, seem to converse with each other. The “pergolas” on
both facades play a major role in this respect.
Constructed of concrete mock stone, pergolas originally
covered the roof terraces of Block A of the Résidence Palace
facing Block C, but were removed when the building was
enlarged in the 1960s. As for Block C, this originally had no such
pergolas. However, as part of its recent refurbishment, pergolas
similar to the original ones were constructed around the new
service rooms on the roof, as well as covering the new roof
terraces.
BACKLIT EUROPE 23
In the Europa building, these decorative architectural features
are re-interpreted in the form of glazed canopies covering new
terraces. Thin columns and horizontal profiles made of bead-
blasted stainless steel support a roof made of large ultra-clear
glass panels. The columns follow the pattern of the underlying
facade. While not equidistant from each other, they are in line
with the modular structure of the beams (33.75cm apart from
each other) supporting the glazed canopy. With a view to
reducing as much as possible the weight of the load-bearing
elements of the outer side, rainwater is collected from the side of
the zinc-coated facade behind the listed facade via a rectangular
gutter and a series of small downpipes made of the same steel
as the structure. The floors of the terraces are covered with
untreated wood.
The transparency of the building’s photovoltaic umbrella
sheltering the whole Europa building echoes the canopies
covering the terraces and the pergolas.
TO THE SOUTH: THE REAR ESPLANADE
The size and position of the Résidence Palace were originally
designed as a complete break with the traditional urban
landscape. The change of scale the building brought with it
was extended to the Justus Lipsius building, giving the whole
esplanade behind the Résidence Palace – following the
complete demolition of a number of city blocks – the status of
an urban belvedere, looking out over the Chaussée d’Etterbeek
a hundred metres further away and some fifteen metres lower.
The intervening space is taken up by the approach ramps for the
interconnected basement car-parks of the two buildings.
The work on the areas surrounding the Europa building
has not made any fundamental change to this pre-existing
situation, though it has managed to give the area a more human
dimension. The existing building has been demolished and
rebuilt to its original size. It is now coated in zinc, as are the
floors added to the existing building. It now includes a new
circular ramp down to the underground car-parks, surrounded
by service rooms. On the surface, the surrounding area is
designed and planted in such a way as to give firefighting
vehicles access to the whole building.