A consortium including UNStudio has won a competition for the design of the Elysion Congress Center (ECC), seeking to form a clearly identifiable, state of the art congress and conference center for Eindhoven, in the Netherlands. The winning scheme calls for an extension to the current Van der Valk Congress and Event Center, bordering a large parkland connecting the airport and city.

The new scheme seeks to renovate and expand the building’s existing facilities, adding a 1,500-capacity flexible auditorium with a vertical foyer. The design team were challenged to ensure that the existing center could continue operations during the construction of the new facilities. This constraint gave way to a unique design solution in which the extension is placed next to the existing building, with the auditorium cantilevering across the top of the conference center building.

The ECC’s foyer, with wooden staircases and vertical gardens, forms the main connector of the building’s program, including linking the entrances to the congress and conference centers. The vertical foyer also houses multiple areas for relaxing, working, and informal meeting for visitors, including several bars and access to outside spaces.

The design team sought to integrate nature into the building at several levels. The park landscape surrounding the building flows onto the roof and under the elevated structure, while minor demolition to the existing building seeks to strengthen the ecology of a nearby important waterway. The façade of the congress center is principally made of timber and glass, with the ambition of integrating nitrogen dioxide-absorbing surfaces to capture pollutants from their surroundings. The new buildings will also generate more energy than they consume, using innovative bromide flow batteries to store energy, and incorporating the largest electric car station in the region.

The 1,500-capacity auditorium has been designed to create different configurations. The auditorium can be divided into four independent smaller auditoria, allowing smaller conferences to take place simultaneously. Retractable seating also allows for the auditorium to be used as a banquet hall, while a recording studio can be located in the conference center to host hybrid online and live events. The main structure of the auditorium is built from a combination of timber and steel, while a large window provides visitors to the auditorium with a spectacular view to the skyline of Eindhoven.