Community Centre in Aalst
- Jakob Schoof
For many years, the presbytery garden in Moorsel, which belongs to the municipality of Aalst, was a hortus conclusus for the village priest. But that changed when a new community centre was erected here with a large multipurpose hall and a youth club. The layout of the buildings reflects the topography, which falls away by about seven metres towards the east. The architects located the multipurpose hall at the highest point, next to the former presbytery (a listed building). The hall is accessible both from the street via a forecourt, and from the garden via a storey-height glazed front. The youth club at the south-eastern end of the site, though of a more private character, also has two entrances: to the group rooms on the upper level from the park and to the lower level from the street. Between the hall and the youth club is a terraced open area with seating and a small stage – an area the architects refer to as the “tree space”. In a style characteristic of Mies van der Rohe, internal and external spaces are linked by means of storey-height exposed-concrete walls and anthracite-coloured steel framing that form the load-bearing structure of the new buildings, while also creating a kind of pergola. In addition, the concrete walls separate the geometric “tree space” from the historical park. A third unifying design element can be seen in the deep, closely spaced timber beams, between which, scarcely visible, the lighting and ventilation runs are integrated.
