'It's a sustainable roof or facade for life'

Together with sister company Elshof in Olst, Felspartners specializes in flanging systems. Ten Kleij: "We manufacture in-house and completely custom-made low-felt systems in zinc, copper or titanium, and we partner with various German brands, Kalzip being the high-felt system in aluminum. Our strength: the different shapes and flexibility of the materials zinc, copper and aluminum. It is easily deformable. In Kalzip aluminum we are also able to create three-dimensional shapes, even with a substructure which is often only two-dimensional. We know all the technical applications of the material; engineering is our strength."

Ten Kleij is still as enthusiastic as he was when he started 30 years ago. "The material is light and therefore extremely suitable for renovation. We work out our ideas meticulously to repair difficult and often hard-to-reach structures. We do this in a way that causes little to no inconvenience to the end user and does not require him to leave the premises; the production process continues as usual. For example, we were allowed to renovate the two blue pointed roofs of the Castalia, better known as the Tits in The Hague, which houses two ministries. With thoughtful construction and expert assembly, the roof system will last up to 50 years. Then we disassemble it, melt it down and manufacture new sheets again. A felsystem is for life."