Commission: Green Carpet
Almere is a ‘New Town’ with a lot of young inhabitants. The people are young at heart and the city has a flexible, experimental attitude. It’s growing fast and looking for an attractive image in which ‘green’ plays an essential role: the green of youthful, sustainable, healthy and fresh.
Taking place in Almere in 2022, the Floriade offers an excellent opportunity to tune up the city’s profile and image. After all, the theme of this year’s horticultural exhibition is ‘Growing Green Cities’. To make the most of this opportunity, the city has been plotting a route, initially from Almere Central Station to the Esplanade, called ‘The Green Carpet’. At a later stage, this Carpet was extended across the water to link up with the Floriade grounds.
The city appealed to the expertise of concept developer Mothership to develop a vision on this ‘green road to tomorrow’: the road to the Floriade and a permanent, green blueprint for the city. The Carpet is based on Almere’s so-called ‘eight squares strategy’: in a single grand gesture, the route also connects eight squares in the city centre.
Vision
By giving art and culture a role and permanently interweaving them in the DNA of the city centre, Almere adds an extra layer to its public space. Representing this singularity will give the city’s cultural identity a new aura and make the city centre more pleasant and attractive to residents, users and visitors.
On the basis of this starting point, which is leading for the work of Mothership, we investigated what it is that distinguishes Almere from other cities, what is typical of Almere and what its residents can (or should) be proud of. We subsequently developed a vision that resulted in a plan that included a series of artistic interventions, social events and suitable works of art. The execution of this plan is in progress and will take several more years. Naturally, this work is done in collaboration with stakeholders including, first and foremost, local residents.
Mothership’s vision for The Green Carpet includes various proposals for Almere and also indicates which choices we think will lead to the best results.
Green? Sea Green!
‘Green’ was Almere’s starting point. It is – rightly – a theme that many cities pick up on; it’s also the theme of the Floriade. Many things can be called green: trees and plants, health, organics, energy, sustainability, youth. These are traits that every city wants to propagate.
But Almere has a unique history, something that undeniably sets it apart: this town was built on a former seabed. There are few cities that can say the same and it’s a characteristic that has to be reflected. As young as the city is, its history is impressive.
In addition to its green ambition, blue can therefore also be said to be typical of Almere. The city can distinguish itself by expressing this: land + water = green + blue = Sea Green.
The theme of Almere’s Green Carpet in Almere is: Sea Green!
Concept
In our vision, The Green Carpet is a Sea Green Carpet that points at the identity of the city in different places in its centre.
Our suggestions for the Sea Green Carpet include the use of art and culture to tell the story of the city’s ambitions, of individuality, green, softness, social cohesion, experience and perception.
We presented approximately 20 proposals to sketch a future route along striking locations, special seating, beautiful murals, gardens as meeting places at stony locations, stencil drawings marking the walking route, events taking place on flat roofs, workshops for schools, works of art in the public space and various other interventions.
We aimed to realize these together with artists and architects, local entrepreneurs, local residents, creative organizations and parties such as the Floriade, Prorail and Dutch Railways NS.
All proposals, whether they come from Mothership directly or from the creatives we invited, are themed Sea Green. This means that we direct each concept in accordance with the meaning of this and that all initiatives must strengthen the vision and ultimately lead to a new, positive and typical image for the city.
We will find out which of our proposals will actually be realized in the coming years.
Visibility
We’re currently creating a large work of art on the exterior of Almere Central Station in which artist Geert Mul shows what the city looks like under water.
At the station itself, we’re creating a sound work that will give visitors the feeling of travelling on escalators from the seabed to the water surface (and vice versa).
In the future, the bus station will have a ceiling that looks like the sea surface thanks to artist Peetah.
Artist Jan van der Ploeg has provided a huge seating object called Zeebank (Sea Bench) with a skin that combines all of the colours of the ocean. The ‘snake’ was designed by Lola Landscape Architects as part of their plan for the new, green design of the Stadhuispromenade as a city park.
Impact
In the slipstream of our proposals for Almere, we’re developing a work of art for Lesley Bamberger, owner of the Kroonenberg Group, which owns a number of retail properties around the central railway station. Based on our work for Almere Central Station, Bamberger asked us to find an artist to create a work on a large blind façade adjoining the public space of a square. Visual artist Iwan Smit made a design for this wall.
With reference to our vision, the Floriade approached us to make the opening ceremony a special experience for local residents. We designed a 200-metre long floating pier that runs into the water from the Weerwater, towards the Floriade grounds. At the end of the connected pontoons is a large square with a central work of water art by artist Meike Justine Ziegler. This work is the result of a collaboration with the future Art Museum Flevoland.
The pier end has the form of a quadrant, with an interactive fountain in the shape of a geyser in the middle. The water pulses to the heartbeat of Almere’s residents. Visitors can walk straight into the water and back again, so they can admire the Almere skyline from the water.
And there is more to see from there, for example a special work of light art developed by Mothership. Every evening, 30 large interactive light beams will be used to give a light show. The lights are attached to a Tennet high-voltage pylon in the middle of the Weerwater. During the Floriade, that is, for 180 days, they will create a fairy-like atmosphere on and around the water once it is dark. Almere residents will be asked to programme the various light shows together with Mothership.
The Floriade also asked and received the Countdown Clock we used for the Eurovision Song Contest. Almere can thus mark the run-up to the start of the horticultural exhibition every day.
And last but not least: our Bobbing Forest, which put Mothership on the map globally, is bobbing about in Almere these days. After spending five years in the Rijnhaven in Rotterdam, it’s been transferred to its new berth especially for the Floriade.
At the request of and during the world-famous horticultural exhibition, it is moored there to draw attention to climate change and, in particular, rising sea levels. It’s good to see that our work is actually contributing to the raising of awareness!