Interview Han van den Born (former Partner KCAP) in 'Inside Rotterdam Magazine':

Long before the Red Apple, KCAP was asked to devise an urban plan for the Wijnhaven ('Wine Harbour') Island, a small area nestled between the city centre and the river Maas. Van den Born: “After the war, this island was rebuilt with office buildings that were in need of renovation by the 1990s. It was around that time that the city set out to attract new residents to the centre by adding apartment buildings. Simply tearing these offices down would be wasteful, so Kees Christiaanse (founder of KCAP) and our team came up with a dynamic transformation model with guidelines for the area as a way to combine the old with the new.

The Red Apple is accentuated in Rotterdam’s skyline by its ‘red striped’ façade pattern. The tower reveals the red bands as vertical lines which decrease in width towards the top to support its slender appearance. The block building is defined by horizontal layers. The red bands are formed by aluminium panels which gain their colour through anodizing without any other colour treatment. In the tower, they contain the load bearing structure of the façade and adapt in width to the increasing load towards street level.

The lifestyle concept and interior have been developed in cooperation with designer Jan des Bouvrie. With a great diversity of residences in intimate urban surroundings, The Red Apple satisfies the demands of modern lifestyles.

Interview Han van den Born (former Partner KCAP) in 'Inside Rotterdam Magazine':

Over the years, KCAP has become known as a firm specialising in sustainable urban regenerations. Van den Born elaborates: “We interpret ‘sustainable’ not purely in terms of energy efficiency or the use of healthy materials. It is about social sustainability as well. We are about creating urban environments where people want to live long-term, with a mix of functions that creates liveliness day and night. As a resident of the Red Apple, I am surprised by the sense of community we have here: we organise barbecues, take care of each other’s pets and now we’ve saved up money to transform the lobby into a meeting space with Wi-Fi and coffee. On the other hand, city dwelling still offers a sense of anonymity. I think that appeals to a lot of people.”

"We convinced our client that unobstructed vistas were the main selling point and used an insanely high percentage of glass panes. At the time of construction, a cheaper, better type of solar glass became available, allowing us to create floor to ceiling panes. It also kept the construction budget within limits, which made apartments affordable for middle-income households. For an architect, it is quite simple to design a tower for millionaires, but that does not interest me much. Here at the Red Apple, we created a flexible floor plan with smaller and larger units, making it possible to live on 75 m2 or to combine multiple units for a more spacious flat. This resulted in an interesting mix of residents, from young professionals and empty nesters to expats. It’s interesting to see that expats are more used to apartment living, even when they start families.