When the decision was finally made years ago in favor of urban expansion on the east side of Amsterdam, it was already certain that this neighborhood had to allow room for new architectural forms and individual expression. With these criteria in mind, work was carried out on the realization of 29 homes in the Zuidbuurt of Steigereiland, which were built according to the UltiMulti concept. UltiMulti stands for a new, interactive, and individual design concept for newly built homes.
Within this concept, future residents could exert a very significant influence on the composition of their home. Residents could choose the number of floors and thereby the volume, the floor plans, and the appearance of the house (facade layout and materials). Combining a massive number of variants and options in this project led to a great diversity of housing types and high living enjoyment.
This could well become a new trend in residential construction. Not an off-the-shelf, ready-made mass-produced new-build house. But neither the other end of the spectrum, completely custom-build plots. "That custom building is only for the happy few, people who have the money for it, or who know what they're doing," says Bob Jansen (41), owner of project developer Lingotto. "But between that and mass production, there was nothing." Lingotto, together with Ymere, offered a completely new concept on Steigereiland (IJburg). "People could put their own home together like Lego at the kitchen table on the website ultimulti.nl and immediately see what it would cost," according to Jansen.
"There were sixty different floor plans on it," adds Klaas Klouwer (57), the director of KBK Bouw from Volendam. "And no fewer than ninety choices in window designs."
Jansen: “That’s how we had hundreds of variants. People could fill in how many floors they wanted, what kind of bricks for their facade, continuous floors or voids, many or few windows. Once they had figured it out, they emailed their own design to the real estate agent.”
The modules were designed by TBE Architects, but that played a minor role here. “The buyers were, as it were, their own architects. Hence, the design of the modules was also very understated.”
“The buyer turned the knobs,” said Klouwer, “even though that meant a lot of work for the contractor. But we specifically want to lead the way in this method of building, with a lot of freedom for the buyer.”
The core of this so-called private commissioning is that every buyer enters into their own agreement with the contractor, meaning a separate building permit must also be applied for for each home. "That means much more guidance than normal during a construction project," Klouwer explains, "but the buyer doesn't have to arrange anything themselves; they have peace of mind."
At any rate, the residents are very satisfied, they noted alongside their grades: about the freedom to arrange their home themselves, about the diversity that has resulted from this. And about the nearby Diemerpark. Bert Leegwater (37) is one of those buyers. “When I saw the Ultimulti website, I was immediately sold. It was getting too small for us in the Eastern Docklands, and we were looking for a house with space and a garden. This felt like: you ask, we deliver.”
"The asking price is also more than reasonable," Leegwater believes. He ended up paying 430,000 euros for a four-story house, 240 square meters, plus a garden and a roof terrace. "And A-quality."
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