An archetypal barn as a port icon

On the renovated Handelskade Zuid, a characterful offshoot of the Twente Canal, the Harbour Pavilion stands as a clear and almost sculptural gesture in the harbor landscape. The canopy forms one entity above a snack bar and an electricity shed, but looks like an independent building: a silver-gray barn form that exudes robustness and simplicity.

The pavilion owes its recognizable silhouette to 21 hot-dip galvanized steel trusses constructed from IPE 300 sections. The regular rhythm of these portals gives the structure a powerful cadence, clearly legible both up close and from the water.

A reverse greenhouse construction

Between twelve of the twenty-one trusses, the space is filled in with glass. This creates an inverted greenhouse, with the glass volume lying within the contours of the steel frame. The laminated single glass serves purely to keep out rain and wind, making the space feel sheltered yet open.

The glass panels, almost two meters high, are sandwiched in set steel profiles that are attached with four bolts to the flanges of the portals-connections that were deliberately kept visible for a technically honest look. The bankirai wood floor extends into the wide deck on the waterfront, seamlessly blending building and quay.