Treat of Utrecht: A run-down miscellaneous collection of old buildings has been given new vigour and dignity in a series of daring moves of great sensitivity

Architectural Review, The, Oct, 2002 by Peter Blundell Jones

Look at a couple of photos, or worse the plan, and the cacophony of forms seems to suggest that in this final work Miralles really went over the top. With scant respect for a fine Neo-Classical work, he seems to have produced a building full of twists and turns, curves and skews, revelling in confusion. Bauwelt's critic savaged him mercilessly for incoherence and a complete lack of taste in this 'collage-architecture'. (1)

But the plan of the building before he started reveals that most of the complexity and contradiction was already present, and that the Neo-Classicism was only a pair of facades, mere stage sets already at odds with each other. Miralles inherited a building that had grown in stages over 700 years, carrying evidence of every age. None of the periodic plans to wipe the slate and start again had been carried through, and if as the largest intervention, the nineteenth-century Neo-Classical front, increased the sense of order, it also meant the worst destruction, because it replaced a Renaissance facade which today would be far more highly valued. (2) By the time the municipal authorities sought an architect in 1996 they had learned the virtue of historical continuity and wanted a firm capable of working with the given. They interviewed 31 architects, commissioned two sketch designs, then chose Miralles.

Utrecht, a leading market town in the Middle Ages, was granted its charter in 1122. The site of the town hall lies at its very heart, on a bend in the Oudegracht, the main canal formed from a branch of the Rhine. A row of eight houses had been erected there by the end of the fourteenth century by prominent families whose names they still carry, and the market was held directly in front. Recognizing this as the optimum site, the burgeoning municipality bought up the houses one by one for administrative uses, starting with the one on the right for the council and the left one as cloth hall, guild hail and exchange. In 1547, extra space was added to the market by covering the canal between two bridges to make more of a square. By the end of the sixteenth century, the council house had a fine Renaissance facade and a bell tower on its roof, while the law courts next door had a bold doorway and a balcony for declarations, but the faces of the original eight houses remained visible. Further houses were bought, and municipal functions developed like a rabbit warren, including eventually the city archives, prison, orphanage, post office, and fire station. The municipal wine store was established in the row of old cellars beneath the houses in 1549, which led on to use as a drinking place and finally a restaurant. Fine rooms came and went. In 1823, a decision was made to demolish the whole decrepit chaos and start again, but it only got as far as replacing the facade to the council and law court parts with the Neo-Classical front. By 1840, Classical treatment had been carried around the side and rear, but the fabric within remained. The former law court was wedged oddly in between, and the axes of the two entrances failed to meet. In 1876 the municipality bought further houses for conversion to administrative use, and by 1916, it finally owned the entire row: all had largely been rebuilt, but piecemeal so that individual identities remained. Plans made in the 1920s and '30s for a total rebuild were postponed, and in 1940 the registry office was put in a new linear wing at the back. Drastic post-war plans, including building a glass tower and swathes of demolition to improve traffic flow in the area, fortunately also remained on paper.

Like many much-converted buildings, the complex had become a tatty and confusing labyrinth, 'out at the elbows' as commentators put it. (3) Abused by thoughtless infill, poor additions and provisional arrangements frozen into permanence, it lacked daylight, and offered no disabled access, Its stairs and corridors were mean and narrow, and the acoustics of the council chamber were poor. On the other hand, neglect had meant that many treasures from the past had been preserved, some set in the fabric and others lurking in attics. Amazingly, some original structures from the fourteenth-century houses persisted, at least in the cellars. Miralles was faced with the problem of sifting the evidence and preserving what seemed of value, while bending the complex to the municipality's current needs. Many administrative offices had already been decanted away from the centre, but representative functions were to stay: the town hall as the seat of the Council, of municipal receptions and as the place of marriage. It was to recover its role as provider of public information with increase of foyer and reception spaces. Essential municipal offices and those for political parties were retained, and some special offices added, such as that of the Ombudsman.

Miralles's main idea was to relieve the pressure on Stadhuisbrug -- always a congested space -- by turning the building around and opening it up to a new square behind, on Korte Minrebroederstraat. This would allow new views towards the cathedral and create a new focus in the crowded centre, with space for bars and restaurants to spill onto the pavement. It required the demolition of the last addition, the utilitarian 1940 registry block, along with clutter around and between. Miralles could leave the old facades most of the way around the old building: the one to Stadhuisbrug--the original front-was faithfully restored with the original house names picked out along the cornice. The grand entrance is still used by councillors on ceremonial occasions. The other Neo-Classical facades, to Oudkerkhof and Korte Minerebroaderstraat, were also restored, and the former rear entrance has found a new role more fitted to its axial grandeur. This is now the wedding door, where couples emerge to meet friends and be photog raphed, with a tell-tale red carpet when in use. Miralles also preserved the facades onto Ganzenmarkt, cheekily reworking the old corner entrance as a bay within the staff cafeteria. This left him the difficult task of remaking the inside corner facing the new square, a case of changing backs into fronts and generating an asymmetrical main entrance to compete with the Neo-Classical might of the wedding door.