This is a video of the disaster that struck the Technological University in Delft at May 13th, 2008. The faculty of Architecture (and townplanning, and social housing, among others) burnt down and is now "total loss". I guess it will be demolished soon.
No one was injured during the fire. However, the fire destroyed many rare books and ancient maps, plus many art collections and drawings by famous architects. It also destroyed the places I was educated to be an engineer.
Gone are the places where we laughed and cried, hoped and feared. A part of my past is ruined.
The shaking in the video is partly due to my emotions...
The fire is said to have been caused by a coffeemachine, that was short-circuited due to a leak in the water infrastructure earlier in the weekend. The fire started on the 6 floor. I used to hang out on the 11th, which used to be the townplanning floor - I stayed mainly at POLIS, the townplanning study group (GREAT computergames we had there, Shuffle Cafe and SimCity2000).
The building had 13 floors as far as I can remember.
If you wonder about the number of floors: many floors had double heigth (hence the high windows), so the light would shine brightly on own designs. There were floors in between with offices, and large vides to let in the light.
In the first year, a professor told us the building wasn't insured. To pay an insurance would cost the university a fortune, so they didn't. I can remember he told a bit about the way students would get roasted when they would try to escape in the staircases, but that didn't come true today.
There were other horror stories about the building, as how many fires a year there were (two each day, if I do remember correctly). The building would collaps if a truck would drive into the pillars at the front as well (pillars are on the northern side, not filmed).
The building might look ugly from the outside, but it was very convenient on the inside. It had many different stairs and corners and stuff, so anyone inside learned about architecture in real life. We used to make drawings from all kinds of angles in this building, just to learn how to make an architectural drawing. It was a building full of surprises that way.
There was a large collection of chairs inside. We drew them, too, Rietveld chairs and others... all turned to ashes now I guess. Same with the art collection. And other pretty things.
Not to mention the many books. I used to feel at home in the library. It was very cosy and they had all kinds of interesting books. The best were on the lower shelves, covered in dust. Many had Fraktur fonts, hard to read German books on castles an such. There was a splendid collection of magazines. And of course the work of former students (alumni) that was stored here. Maybe some of my own writings have been burnt too...
The library was on the ground floor. The map treasury was on the first floor last time I checked.
It was always a great place for inspiration for Daleth.
In the post-apocalyptic novel "Dutch Courage" from 2005, the University is basically gone. I quote myself: "When they made a simulation of the floods to see how to prevent it a next time, the water got from the basins into the high-voltage building across the street, and short-circuited the whole university. It burned down. And what didn't burn, exploded when the fire reached the Faculty of Chemistry and Off Shore Techniques. The only thing left is the Academic Library, because it rained just before the fire, and all the books were soaked."
Water, short circuit, fire, total destruction. Very weird.
This video is for my friends who have cherished memories of this place. And all others who feel the loss. Including the students who had there stuff stored here.
Music is by Siouxsie Sioux and the Banshees, Cities in Dust. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.
PS: if you wondered: I'm a townplanner. I stayed in that building from 1989 to 1995. Sometimes it was like I lived there. I learned to work with computers there, on an ancient Mac Classic II that is now probably lost too. I remember repairing the sound system in the POLIS office, and our dummy, who was called Gijs (I think) - both lost, I guess. I remember a couch we slept on. I remember lots of wine, too...
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