Cities and their making understood and sometimes imagined .
The next phase of climate planning is not simply about cooling cities. It is about redistributing growth, resources and opportunity before crisis does it for us. The familiar climate map is beginning to move. As the recent Financieele Dagblad article “Grote delen van de wereld krijgen nieuw klimaattype” describes,...
The next phase of climate planning is not simply about cooling cities. It is about redistributing growth, resources and opportunity before crisis does it for us. The familiar climate map is beginning to move. As the recent Financieele Dagblad article “Grote delen van de wereld krijgen nieuw klimaattype” describes,...
This week, Vinkham Mansharani, a Harvard researcher, published a book, titled “Think for yourself”. It emphasizes the need for generalists – people that know a lot about many things...
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...
Last week, travelling through Finland, I followed the footsteps of Alvar Aalto. From Helsinki to Rovaniemi, from Turku to Jyväskylä, I visited his sanatoria, civic centres, libraries, and houses....
Gaza, Reimagined as an Asset Class Gaza’s rubble isn’t a tragedy in this plan—it’s a business opportunity. The GREAT Trust masterplan treats the destruction of an entire society as...
For decades, urban planners, politicians, consultants, and development agencies have promised that better measurement would lead to better cities. If we could count enough things, compare enough indicators, and...
Take a journey. Not a comfortable one.
It took a while to finally conclude who will be President of the United States from January 20th on. The outcome in the end is what was predicted. But...
The day Donald Trump was elected, I was attending the World Urban Forum in Cairo. Contrary to what many of us believed, it wasn’t just the white, aged countryside...
The next phase of climate planning is not simply about cooling cities. It is about redistributing growth, resources and opportunity before crisis does it for us. The familiar climate...
European cities are three-dimensional spatial constructs. But if we look at the plans we make, then the third dimension is strangely absent. Apart from the definition of building heights...
Eight years ago Saudi Arabia embarked on a highly ambitious process to profoundly change the country within a short 15 years. They called it Vision 2030. With its three...
As artificial intelligence grows more capable by the month, societies everywhere are wrestling with a question that feels both futuristic and strangely ancient: what will be left for human...
Why sustainable choices are creating unexpected conflicts Every spring, the same scenes unfold on the regional railway lines connecting Berlin with the lakes of Brandenburg and the beaches 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,...
For several decades, globalization appeared to be an unstoppable force. Goods, ideas, and people moved across borders with unprecedented ease, and cities became the laboratories of this interconnected age....
Future life in extremely hot climate Four degrees are what scientists predict the temperature will rise in the Middle East by mid-century[i] – twice the global average. Record temperatures...
I am attending many conferences and workshops lately and there is one thing that keeps making me angry: the proliferation of meaningless terms everybody feels happy with. The word...
I had the honour to be invited to the What is the Future of Cities Podcast. “Are you interested in finding the real problem of the urban fabric? What do you think about robustness vs antifragility? How can we improve our feedback loops in the building industry?” and many more questions we covered in this […]
I had the honour to be invited to the What is the Future of Cities Podcast. “Are you interested in finding the real problem of the urban fabric? What...
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.
