By Editor Design.nl / 27-05-2010

The ‘Rotterdam Water City’ pavilion at the Shanghai World Expo 2010 offers visitors a chance to ‘experience’ life below sea level. A competition was held for the design in 2008, and following careful consideration of a number of entries, the proposal by the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam was selected as the winning design. 

The pavilion is located in the ‘Urban Best Practices Area’. In this section of the World Expo, fifty metropolises demonstrate their solutions to current urban problems. Represented at the Expo in its own unique way, Rotterdam joins cities such as Seoul, Hong Kong, Taipei, Milan, Madrid, Paris, London, Montreal and Sao Paulo.

THE ROTTERDAM APPROACH
Rotterdam takes the view that climate change is an opportunity. Innovative applications in the area of water management combine to make the city more attractive while at the same time boosting the economy. This makes this delta metropolis at Europe’s lowest point below sea level an inspiring example to other delta cities.

In the years to come, delta cities all over the globe will have to adjust to climate change. Rotterdam has ample experience with flood management and water management: rises in temperature, heavier downpours, and higher river and sea levels require innovative solutions in this low-lying, densely populated urban area.

Participation in the World Expo is part of the Rotterdam Climate Proof programme that aims to make the city climate proof by 2025. Rotterdam Climate Proof is part of the coordinating body Rotterdam Climate Initiative.

THE DESIGN
Central to the design are water, climate, flood management, and innovation. There is a life-sized levee, a water plaza, green roofs and an artificial cloud mimicking the unpredictable climate of the Netherlands. Multimedia presentations, experiments and 3D scale models will provide visitors with a realistic notion of the solutions Rotterdam has devised. The floor of the pavilion itself, for instance, consists of a water plaza that is flooded continually by an artificial cloud. No matter how hard it ‘rains’ inside the pavilion, the visitors will never get their feet wet!

Levels and Elements
The design of ‘Rotterdam Water City’ is separated into two levels:
Level 1: the water plaza surrounded by display panels.
Level 2: the levee and the floating spheres, both accessible by means of a specially designed staircase.

Artificial cloud and water printer
An artificial cloud, changing colour depending on the desired weather, will flood the water plaza. A central element in the design is a water printer several metres high, displaying a variety of texts and images.

Water plaza
The water plaza – a Rotterdam invention – discharges water in times of heavy rain showers, preventing water from collecting in the streets and effectively flooding them. In dry weather, the plaza doubles as a playground for children.

Levee
Attracting people’s attention with a levee, Rotterdam instills a perception of safety in the city despite its location below sea level.

Green roofs
Apart from being pleasing to the eye, green roofs are also sustainable, energy-saving, sound-attenuating, and especially excellent places to store water in extreme downpours. The City of Rotterdam actively pursues the goal of realizing tens of thousands of square metres of green roofs in Rotterdam. The pavilion presents several prototype roofs.

Presentations
The use of visual techniques allows the ‘Rotterdam Water City’ pavilion to provide a life-like image of various situations, creating the illusion, for example, that visitors are actually in Rotterdam for a brief moment.

The budget of the Rotterdam pavilion was 2 million euros. Spatial designers TomDavid Architecten were also part of the design team.

Her Royal Highness Princess Máxima and His Royal Higness Crown Prince Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands officially opened the ‘Rotterdam Water City’ pavilion. They visited the pavilion in the company of Mayor Aboutaleb of Rotterdam.

Photography: FAR China / Giel Groothui, TomDavid Architecten

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