Looking back at Modernist Amsterdam

After it was finished in 1962, the Amsterdam suburb of Geuzenveld had 4433 houses, about 100,000 trees, 40 playgrounds and one (Chinese-Indonesian) restaurant. All modern ideas Dutch urban planners had about creating neighbourhoods were applied here and the six architects chosen to each develop an area of the plan were the crème de la crème of the nation. Three of these architects were acclaimed modernists. The three others, among them Dudok, were somewhat more traditional.

Although the houses were built by building societies, civil servants dominated the requirements and restrictions. The city required houses urgently and the architects got six months for developing and finalising their design. The result somewhat disappointed urban planner Van Eesteren, who complained there was not enough unity in the result. He concluded his requirements to the architects had not been detailed enough.

In line with the Modern Movement, the floor plan of the houses and flats was the product of rational analysis to produce a maximum of use for the 12 functions in a family (sleeping, cooking, playing, etc.) on a minimal scale with a minimal use of materials and independent of "personal preferences". Given the urgency for new houses and the sober post-war budgets, the minimal requirement also became the government's maximal requirement. The government set requirements for every detail of a house.

The construction was also done in a rational and methodical way to reduce building costs. The quality of the construction methods was not yet high and resulted in noisy buildings.

The design of the neighbourhood follows the ideas of the Congrès International d'Architecture Moderne (strangely, the book does not mention that Van Eesteren presided over the conference of 1933). The architects wanted to create "on organic unity" for life (but not work; work was expected to be within 30 minutes cycling time, mainly in the harbour). This required schools, churches, shops, sports facilities and lots of greenery. All "amenities" were based upon demographic and social-scientific research and calculated with mathematical precision. The primary school defined the size of an area: each 800 households needed one. Hence Geuzenveld consists of 6 areas, each constructed by a separate building society. Given low levels of religiosity, there were only two churches and various community centres. Playgrounds were built for every 100 households and green spaces were always available at a maximum distance of 400 metres. The architects were keen on developing a community spirit and planned various facilities for people to meet, but these never became very popular: a garage for your car was planned in another housing block.

Quite a few of the older buildings have been demolished or are planned to be demolished. The original houses and flats were all rented, it is now planned that 55% will be owned by the inhabitants. According to the author, the 111 nationalities now living in Geuzenveld mostly endorse the values of the modernist plan.

Although produced together with the local council and despite the fact that the chapter on the Beggars (eponyms of the suburb) leaves a few things to be desired, this is another fine history of the paternalistic post-war reconstrucion of the Netherlands. The book disappoints in its coverage of the area now (did the counsel sponsor the book?). The old and new photographs are very good, though. ( )