At the Bucky Lab we are convinced that education should not stop at the drawing board. In 2024, our students were part of a project that brought together COA (the Dutch Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers), ONE (Office for the New Earth), and TU Delft. The shared goal: to create a meaningful, sustainable space for unaccompanied minors at the asylum centre in Leidschendam.
The overall pavilion design was developed by ONE, who also led the final realization. Within this framework, our Bucky Lab students explored a wide range of functions and infill concepts – interior modules, furniture systems, and activity spaces that could be applied across future pavilions. Their ideas provided COA with a toolbox of options, from which a selection was made to suit the first built pavilion.
The pavilion that now stands in Leidschendam measures roughly 6 × 8 × 4.5 meters. It offers space for about fifteen young people to come together for workshops, play, or simply time away from their shared living quarters. Inside, the flexible “Blox” furniture system – designed as part of the Bucky Lab explorations – allows the space to be rearranged in endless ways. Natural daylight, ventilation, plant boxes, and warm wooden finishes help transform the building from a mere shelter into a welcoming environment. Ideas for the façade and roof cladding as also the sunshading was also proposed for the pavilion and found its way into the final pavilion.
While ONE built the full-scale pavilion, a small group of our students joined the process after the course, assisting on site and experiencing the transition from design to construction. For them, it was a rare and valuable chance to see their ideas materialize in real scale and to contribute to a building that now has a direct social impact.
For us, the project demonstrates the power of collaboration: ONE’s design vision, COA’s social mission, and our students’ creativity came together in a pavilion that is sustainable, demountable, and above all human in its intention. It shows that architecture, even at the scale of a small timber structure, can offer dignity and care to those who need it most.
