Hoekenrodeplein lies directly next to the busy Amsterdam Bijlmer ArenA station, between ArenA Boulevard and Amsterdamse Poort shopping centre. The square was intended to become the new heart of Amsterdam Zuidoost: redevelopment began in 2011, with a full renovation of the building around it, which now houses a hotel and hospitality units with terraces.

Landscape architects karres+brands designed the square on behalf of stadsdeel Zuidoost, the City of Amsterdam, across an area of 2.1 hectares. The design had to combine traffic, lingering and events: natural stone seating edges bridge the level differences and guide pedestrian flows, while the square was given a dynamic lighting scheme that responds to the number of people and the activity on the square. Between 2013 and 2015, Hoekenrodeplein was given new paving, natural stone, lighting and planting.

Van den Berk Boomkwekerijen supplied the planting: sixteen Metasequoia glyptostroboides (dawn redwood), with a trunk girth of 150 centimetres and a height of around fifteen metres. The trees were delivered in early 2014, including three years of aftercare and warranty. Pius Floris Amsterdam carried out the planting, under the guidance of our adviser Thieu Pije

Dawn redwood is one of the few conifers that loses its foliage in autumn, turning a striking rusty brown before leaf fall. Because of the size of the sixteen trees, the square already looked green on completion, rather than only after years of growth.