Cities and their making understood and sometimes imagined .
There is a peculiar ritual that plays out with remarkable consistency across the world’s capital cities. A government, freshly energised by a new administration or a once-in-a-generation development mandate, commissions an international benchmarking study. Consultants are hired, flights are booked, PowerPoint decks multiply. Somewhere in the resulting report, Singapore...
There is a peculiar ritual that plays out with remarkable consistency across the world’s capital cities. A government, freshly energised by a new administration or a once-in-a-generation development mandate, commissions an international benchmarking study. Consultants are hired, flights are booked, PowerPoint decks multiply. Somewhere in the resulting report, Singapore...
Riyadh has never been a city at rest. From tribal camp to oil capital, from desert silence to the roar of six-lane highways, it has lived many lives. Today,...
For more than a century, architectural education has wrestled with its own insecurity. Suspended between art and engineering, between cultural speculation and technical necessity, it has often sought legitimacy...
When Airbnb launched in 2008, it promised something disarmingly simple: to connect travelers with locals willing to share their homes. It was part of the hopeful dawn of the...
How snow, sabotage, and sudden silence expose the fragile systems behind urban life—and why moments of failure may be our best guide to building resilient cities A few centimeters...
Since more than twenty years, I am regularly coming to China. Ever since I went there for the first time, there have been talks that the real estate bubble...
Why Social Media Feels Like a Monofunctional City The pattern is always the same. You scroll through a social media platform or a video platform, or you buy something...
If Hong Kong is the city that invented tomorrow, Shenzhen is the one that looked at tomorrow’s blueprints, said “Hold my tea,” and went ahead to build it by...
Riyadh’s is rapidly expanding – in population and urbanized area. The Decision: Growth Riyadh announced that it was lifting the suspension on 33.24 square kilometres of land in the...
There is a peculiar ritual that plays out with remarkable consistency across the world’s capital cities. A government, freshly energised by a new administration or a once-in-a-generation development mandate,...
It is a well known fact: Globally, cities are growing, and they will keep growing in the decades to come. The other – less known fact is, that growth...
Judging the words of pretty much every company, every city mayor and every architect and urbanist, dealing with climate change is at the heart of each and every decision...
Saudi Arabia is building at a pace and scale the world has rarely seen. Across its deserts and coastlines, extraordinary visions rise: NEOM’s The Line, a 170-kilometer-long city of...
by a European Urban Planner Practicing on the Arab Peninsula I arrived in Saudi Arabia with a well-worn European planner’s toolkit—deep respect for history, a belief in incremental progress,...
by Markus Appenzeller and Thijs Spaandonk This Manifesto emerges from, and reflects on, a series of talks by a diverse group of climate specialists and students that Thijs van...
Riyadh’s ambitious municipal reform offers a rare chance to move beyond mega-projects. The city’s future depends on whether new districts and Madinty offices become engines of urban quality, not...
If you have to believe the Dutch government, the country is lacking around 1 million homes. That is a staggering number for a country with 17.5 million inhabitants. One...
A celebratory – and not entirely serious – reflection for the 61st ISOCARP World Planning Congress Every year (or in ISOCARP’s case, for the 61st time), planners from around...
BMG, a Georgian news outlet interviewed me about my view on the City of Tbilisi and what problems need to be solved there. Comparing international urban development concepts like the 15 Minute City with what the urban fabric of Tbilisi offers lead to a discussion about the right concepts to use locally: learn – don’t […]
BMG, a Georgian news outlet interviewed me about my view on the City of Tbilisi and what problems need to be solved there. Comparing international urban development concepts like...
On 05 October 2023 I bid farewell to the role of Head of Urbanism at the Amsterdam Academy of Architecture. In my speech, I looked back on six years in that role and what has been achieved, but I also looked forward to what the future of urbanism and urbanism education holds. After that my […]
On 05 October 2023 I bid farewell to the role of Head of Urbanism at the Amsterdam Academy of Architecture. In my speech, I looked back on six years...
I have spent my career moving along the boundaries of architecture, landscape, and urban planning—spaces where disciplines overlap, cities evolve, and new ideas emerge. From London to Shenzhen, Semarang to Accra, my work is driven by a fascination with how places grow, adapt, and shape the lives of the people who inhabit them.
Writing, speaking, and teaching are essential parts of that journey. They allow me to question assumptions, share what I’ve learned, and learn from others in return. I write to make sense of the forces shaping our cities, to communicate ideas clearly, and to provoke thoughtful debate. I teach because every new generation of urbanists brings perspectives that push the field forward. And I speak publicly to connect practice and policy, bridging the gap between technical expertise and the broader conversations cities need.
Today, alongside my work with MLA+, I serve as Chief Technical Adviser to a nationwide spatial planning reform in Saudi Arabia with UNDP and UN-Habitat. When time and context allows, I am also teaching and have been heading the Urbanism Department at the Amsterdam Academy of Architecture and at the Shenzhen International School of Design.
Cities are constantly changing; my motivation is to help steer that change – in words and deeds – toward more resilient, thoughtful, and inspiring futures.
