Nutsbedrijf, Amstelkade 13

English translation

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Description

Introduction

SUBSTATION built by the GEB in 1924 to a design by the Department of Public Works in a business-expressionist style. The substation is freely situated with the representatively treated facades on the square to the south and on the Amstelkanaal to the north. The utilitarian building, through its decorative design, both in urban planning and architectural terms, is a strongly image-defining element. The Borssenburgplein is part of the Plan Zuid developed by H.P. Berlage.

Description

On a composite ground plan, a substation constructed in yellow brickwork in Flemish bond with one and two storeys (at the northeastern corner) under flat and sawtooth roofs. All facades are asymmetrical and built up from rectangular elements. Along the plinth run black glazed tiles. Accents such as the dressed vertical bands and sills, roof edges and the blocks of the windows at the roof edges are of black-painted hard stone. The canopies are of reinforced concrete. The installation ducts on the roof, both the mortared and the zinc, are incorporated in the design. The facade at the Amstelkade, consisting of seven bays, has on the right a set-back single-storey section with double steel entrance doors. At right angles to this, in the transition to the two-storey projecting section, diagonal windows are placed under concrete canopies. The fanlight on the ground floor has at the corner a hard stone ball on a block. The window on the upper floor is less carried through than that on the ground floor. Both windows have glazing bars with staggered horizontal bars. The slightly overhanging upper floor, on a dressed hard stone edge, has two narrow vertical light slots, coupled by a continuous drip moulding. Hard stone heads are located at the top. The eastern facade has four pairs of tall steel doors with, like the other steel doors, woven ornamental grilles, under a diagonal canopy. Below the canopy, at the corner and on the far left, are relief stones with text. In the higher constructed section is a small window. On the transition to the single-storey section a hard stone block is placed. The low extension on the left side has under the diagonal canopy a steel door and next to it a square window with a steel flap.

The south facade has in the low, projecting extension a door and on the corner a higher constructed hard stone roof edge. In the set-back section there are, under the diagonal canopy, a single and a pair of double steel doors. Above these are three small, square windows with stone sills and hard stone blocks as termination. On the roof is a ventilation structure with flat natural stone plates, with balls between them, on a brick base.

The western side facade has a pair of steel doors under the canopy with above them two windows as on the plaza side. The recessed right angle has under a hard stone flat block. The three large, square steel window frames have a multi-pane glazing bar division in steel.

Appreciation

The substation dating from 1924 is of general importance because of its architectural-historical and industrial-archaeological value as an intact and representative example of an early twentieth-century utility building in the manner of the Amsterdam School and because of the historical-functional relationship with the expanding municipal electricity provision. The substation has ensemble value as an image-supporting building within Berlage's Plan Zuid.