Tuindorp Watergraafsmeer, an Unwinesque garden village deconstructed

The layout of the garden village Watergraafsmeer was designed by two architects and based on Unwinesque design principles rather than the garden village schematic by Feenstra. The available space has been parcelled with some public open spaces and without allotments. The whole garden village has been designed as a single spatial entity that is defined on one side by a main road, on one side by an undulating canal separating the housing from the cemetery and on two sides by a narrow green belt  in the shape of a park.

At the heart of the garden village a central square was designed with 4 streets running on the diagonal from each corner. A central axial street link the square both conceptually and practically to the Middenweg (the existing thoroughfare). The streets are foreshortened and not used as sight lines by a bend after a certain length (different for each one of the 4 streets radiating from the corners). The axial street has a symmetrical setup with a variable building line -conform Unwinesque design principles- and long rows of terraced housing creating a more suburban feel. This formal ensemble of the Brinkstraat isn't elevated to main entrance by means of architectural devices. The actual main entrance -in a spatial sense- can be found at the beginning of the green belt at the beginning of the Veeteeltstraat (indicated by *).

Most streets are straight with a variable building line. Some streets are long, most are short. The layout of the garden village is composed of several axial ensembles that angle towards or away from the longer streets. These axial ensembles often incorporate public greenery, but can also focus on "gates" or higher sections of buildings (shown in orange). Most axial ensembles are fully symmetrical. Some are almost symmetrical, but appear symmetrical nonetheless.

To break the perceived length of the streets the building line is set back creating a wider street space. This design device is emphasised by the use of protruding sections of the building or row of buildings. This creates staggered spaces along the streets creating visual interest. By employing protruding sections at the beginning and/or end of a street the unity and singularity of that street is emphasised.

Another Unwinesque device employed in this garden village is the treatment of the corners. This is done by placing buildings on the diagonal, or rounding of the corner of a row of terraced housing. A variation is to be seen in the winged blocks where a corner is emphasised by a central block or terrace (often this building also forms the centre point of the axial ensemble). These winged corners (shown in orange) can be concave with the wings extending beyond the building line or convex with the wings extending behind the building line. The wings typically follow the street or the public space. All these corner solutions have been employed in Tuindorp Watergraafsmeer. Winged blocks are especially prominent around the central Brink square. Some corners are further emphasised in the architecture by raising the roofline to create "corner towers". In the brick buildings with a pitched roof the direction of the ridge is changed thus introducing a gable end that sits next to a roof surface.

Closes were never an integral part of garden city design in the Netherlands. This is linked to the dislike of dead-end streets by politicians and the police. They make however a very efficient way of parcellation possible, so some small closes have been incorporated within the layout of Tuindorp Watergraafsmeer. There are in fact 3 such closes (shown in red) and one inverted close (indicated by i) on a corner. More common is the use of small greens (shown in orange). These are part of many of the axial ensembles within this layout, often as an end point of an axis.

The suburban development which is often typified as varied and pleasantly irregular, in fact employs many formal design devices to create this sense of irregularity. Though the same device is used in more than one location the way it is translated into architecture varies, so the whole garden village surprises at every corner as the outlook is invariably slightly different. The buildings of concrete construction can't be recognised on the plan. They were built in the south-western part of the garden village along Unwinesque design principles but with a different take on architectural form.

Within the section built in concrete (the so-called "Betondorp") two large building are constructed in brick. These are both (former) school buildings on the Huismanshof (1) and the Zuivelplein (2) respectively.