NAP – Normaal Amsterdams Peil

Research: Cartography & Photography

NAP is a photo- and cartographic investigation into the norm of Amsterdam’s housing stock. Our fascination was propelled by the apparent reluctance of our generation to deal with a notion that is both statistically inescapable and urgent with respect to the challenge of affordable middle class housing. Ultimately, raising the qualitative norm of housing provides better for housing for most people.

Why has the norm become such a difficult topic? Why is it implicitly relegated to unnamed 2nd-tier colleagues, or to other professions entirely? Why do we glorify the collaborative approach of the Amsterdamse Stijl but remain incapable, or reluctant, to work together with such deliberation?

This project investigates the norm through mapping parts of the city that were entirely built in one decade and consist of repetitive housing units built in close proximity. Through site visits and photography we sought to capture the guiding principles, aspirations and ideologies of that period. The series clearly reveals certain continuities and ruptures during the last century and seeks to establish a more self-conscious and reflective discourse about the implicit contemporary norms that we apparently find so difficult to acknowledge.