Our moving adventure: from the Splendor factory to the Vasim!

Last Friday 10 November it was finally really time. We left our familiar old office in the Splendor factory behind. That chapter is now over, and this week we start at a completely new workplace in the Vasim. After months of preparing, planning, and solid DIY while the old building slowly crumbled further, we could finally move, and we are really proud of how everything turned out. An adventure that actually started two years ago, but has only now physically landed.

Starting with a wish

From the first moment Ewout and Roland started 10KB, they were housed in one of the spaces of the Splendor factory here in Nijmegen. At the beginning it was simply a fairly compact little office. But the crew grew, so they took out the partition wall to the building next door and rented that space too, and after about eight years those metres also became tight. A concrete wish therefore took shape already two years ago: we were looking for a pleasant and above all spacious office that does not look too much like an ordinary office. Anything on an industrial estate was immediately out, and suspended ceilings are outright forbidden territory. Digging around everywhere for well over a year. Then we found the perfect spot, the Vasim in Nijmegen.

The history of our new home base

It is a building with a long history of its own, and the character fits exactly. Shortly after the Second World War it was built in 1948 as part of the NYMA artificial silk spinning mill. From 1985 it took on a different function. The name still carries that stamp, because for the fifteen years that followed the Vasim ran as a fly ash factory under the banner VliegAsSInterMaatschappij. The hugely vacant factory building got its next reuse in 2002 and was fitted out as a creative breeding ground where, under the Cultuurspinnerij foundation, more than 40 artists and cultural companies found a home. The special real estate has had the municipality of Nijmegen scratching its head for years.

In 2008 people dug into the folders for fresh ideas; in 2012 the municipal board spoke ambitiously about a war museum that had to land there, but two years later that plan fell flat. Whole scenarios shifted and reported, knots tied and untied again, until finally in 2020 the plans lay crystal clear: the entire NYMA site, holding on to that solid culture-spinner foundation, blossoms and transforms into the brand-new Nijmegen attraction with ample breathing room for culture, creative SMEs, sport, events, and something to eat and drink. That we get to contribute our bit here remains, as far as we are concerned, a real honour.

The big plan

Just over a year ago we heard that we were allowed to turn one of those arches into our new office. Honestly though, an incredible amount still had to happen on that transformation front. It was simply a concrete box of about 300 square metres, and almost eleven metres high too. A cold, bare acoustic nightmare was lurking, so we brought in an architect. End of October 2022 Bob Romijnders delivered a plan that fitted seamlessly with what we had in mind: open, light, spacious, with lots of green, exactly as we wanted. Spread over two floors, with the desks upstairs. Downstairs there is every place to relax for a bit, eat and drink something, play a game, or confer with each other in peace, a real second living-room feel, and that runs through this office too.

The hard work

For months we were in talks with contractors and dozens of quotes were requested, accompanied by lines like: "oh, we still need someone for this too." We found the key at MVL, specialised in metalworking. They were immediately enthusiastic about building the steel structure and thought along so well with us; they brought in craftsmen for everything, putting up walls, painting walls, laying floors, erecting glass partitions. With just that steel work we were still far from done.

In the same period Van Berkum also helped us think about the indoor climate and offered structural, sustainable ways to cool and heat the gigantic hall efficiently. On that side things were fine then. And what a difference it made that we could also simply do a whole pile ourselves. The DIYers among our colleagues liked pitching in now and then. They hung dozens of lamps, painted metres of skirting, lacquered two stairs, worked window sills, and stood on scaffolding for days; that happens rather quickly when your lowest ceiling is already at four metres. It has been a grind-and-slog period, working so tightly packed together, in which we visibly and step by step reached that ultimate goal together.

Meanwhile in the Splendor factory

As soon as the plans for a new office became serious, the old building started simulating decay in all kinds of ways. The printer gave up and we decided not to buy a replacement, the move was coming after all, and the coffee machine's bean grinder died, so we switched to pre-ground coffee. Because why would you invest when the brand-new office is almost there? It did not stop there. In half a year the power went out four times for long stretches. What a mess. Our timing was actually perfect. Nothing makes a team hungrier for 'that cool new place' than flickering lights and dying appliances around you.

Ready to move

A day before the move a small crew was ready to put everything in boxes. It is strange how many memories and junk a company can collect. We lunched elsewhere; Robin had emptied and packed the entire kitchen in record time. By the end of the afternoon all computers and screens could come loose, everything stood ready for tomorrow, and we trudged home.

The 'moment suprême'

Moving day could roughly be described as a sports event with a twist. Just before nine we stood at the Splendor factory for the last time. And yes, Murphy stepped in immediately: that morning the goods lift turned out to be broken. The hired moving company stood cursing and hauled for longer than expected. In the Vasim we are also on the first floor, so in that sense it looked like a repeat, but luckily we had fortune with Vasim Events as neighbours. Their two enormous goods lifts simply offered the way out. A whole day assembling and dismantling tables, endlessly unpacking boxes and a lot of groaning, and then it was quiet and the office stood. We closed with a toast. Fittingly the sound system was also checked for volume. We cannot wait to settle in here, again.

Want to come take a look too?

Please come look. Address: Kolk 7, Nijmegen. Better enter that manually, Google pretends our address does not live there yet. We are itching to go, you will see.