Ceramic weaving
A new bus shelter, designed by the local firm of architects Bonnemayer, has recently been built on the Markt in Uden. The bus shelter is part of a recent revamp of a zone at the edge of the market square, designed as strip with different paving. The overall design for the market square incorporates streetlights, benches, rubbish bins and telephone boxes, with the bus shelter being one of the more striking elements. The plan for redesigning the market included a creating a bus shelter with a neat and modern finish. This prompted the Bonnemayer architects to design the bus shelter as a horizontal space, supported in the centre by an oval shaped floor plan and by randomly placed columns at the edges.
Meeting place The construction of the shelter had to incorporate three functions. Firstly, the oval shaped block houses a fully accessible, coin operated toilet. The block also offers space for a power supply for special events such as the funfair and the ‘Uden on Ice’ festival. And, as a third function, the awning of the bus shelter serves as a waiting area for the adjacent taxi stand. In this context, the benches are used for seating and the columns are used to ‘lean against’. The bus shelter is also striking at night due to the LED lights that can emit different colours that are fitted into the awning above the benches.
Striking weave Street objects in public spaces are frequently the target of graffiti and illegal bill posting. This is why the oval shaped block in the bus shelter was produced using a specially shaped black bricks that make it almost impossible to stick posters to it. The undulating bricks are laid vertically because the small radius of the oval shape looked more attractive with horizontal brickwork. The fact that the layers of brickwork are displaced by half a brick in relation to each other gives the block a striking look that is reminiscent of the weaving pattern in a basket or the skin of a reptile.
Facing bricks: Wienerberger Heteren - Avenue zwart, ‘Wave” bricks
Details: Special shaped bricks
