Investigation in the potential of a highway exit as a bearer of a cities identity. In case of the new town Nieuwegein, framed between large scale infrastructure, the design starts of with a positive approach to the cities negative imago of a town of 'nothingness'. The few icons that are present turns out to be landmarks in the context of not only the local but the national historical heritage. If studied closer you can even fall in love with a town like Nieuwegein and its curious past. The famous 'plofsluis', the first highway knot in Holland which caused the first traffic jam, The radio tower and the Beatrix sluises.

The highways exit 'knot' that is landscaped adds a new point of interest in this list of curiosities. It provides the lost traveller with a chance to orientate himself in the sprawl of the cities architecture and plays with the iconic images of both the industrial landscape of Nieuwegein, the highway and the vast emptiness of the polders of Houten. Scale and contrasts between light and dark, tunnel and mountain, fastness and slowness, enclosure and panorama, are exaggerated and intensified. Once driving down the mountain late a night after a days work you can be sure: I’m home again. 

Studyproject Master of Arts Interior Design 2001, Tutoring Els Bet