Van der Valk Hotel Amsterdam Zuidas winner BNA best building 2021

The Van der Valk Hotel Amsterdam Zuidas is the winner of BNA best building of the year 2021.

With the Best Building Award, the Industry Association of Dutch Architectural Firms (BNA) wants to make the added value of architecture visible for people and society. The price is primarily intended for clients and users.

Van der Valk Hotel Amsterdam Zuidas, Amsterdam
A new Van der Valk hotel has been built on the east side of Amsterdam's business district, the 'Zuidas'. The building is approximately 55 meters high and offers space for 240 hotel rooms, restaurants, conference facilities and a spa and wellness area. In addition, there are four above-ground parking levels with a total of 143 parking spaces. The plot of the hotel has a triangular base, with coves towards the top. The building meets the BREEAM OUTSTANDING requirements and thus obtains the highest achievable sustainability certificate.

The construction of hotel rooms is based on a constructive system that is as efficient as possible. This means minimum construction thicknesses and short spans. And everything is prefabricated as much as possible to achieve a short construction time. All room-dividing walls consist of prefab concrete walls of 230 mm thickness and the storey floors of separate prefab plates of 200 mm thick. At the top floor, where the fitness/wellness and spa are located, open steel portals replace part of the walls.

Pieters Bouwtechniek is a construction consultant for this project.

Jury report
With the name Van der Valk, the jury thought of 'brick buildings with a toucan logo'. "However, with this hotel, not only does that name get 'a new dimension', but also the hotel typology," according to the jury report. On an impossible 'postage stamp' in a corner of the Zuidas, Arets designed a 'hotel with a view', partly thanks to floor-to-ceiling windows and the fact that the hotel starts from the 5th floor.