Cities and their making understood and sometimes imagined .
The World Urban Forum is holding its 13th session in Baku this week. Every time I travel to one of these mega conferences, I find myself questioning their purpose. To stop these thoughts from haunting me like that little angel and that little devil on your shoulders, I have...
The World Urban Forum is holding its 13th session in Baku this week. Every time I travel to one of these mega conferences, I find myself questioning their purpose. To stop these thoughts from haunting me like that little angel and that little devil on your shoulders, I have...
and how to fix it I have to make a disclaimer upfront: I am a great admirer of Constantinos Doxiadis, a Greek urban planner that has literally groundbreaking work...
Recently I came across an article in Nature magazine about the annual global consumption of concrete. Worldwide, we use about 30 billion tons of concrete[i] every year. That comes...
Why Saudi Arabia’s next phase of urban growth depends less on how much it builds, and more on where it points its momentum For more than two decades, urban...
The World Urban Forum is holding its 13th session in Baku this week. Every time I travel to one of these mega conferences, I find myself questioning their purpose....
Greetings from Riyadh! It is 47°C outside, the asphalt shimmers, bus stops empty, and even a short trip on foot feels unreasonable. It’s tempting to declare the walkability debate...
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...
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...
The current Mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, has changed the city profoundly and in no time – at least measured by the standards of urban planning. That much is...
The World Urban Forum is holding its 13th session in Baku this week. Every time I travel to one of these mega conferences, I find myself questioning their purpose....
The current narrative of climate change is that of an inevitable development as a result of human progress that we can fix. Depending on the angle, the fixes can...
Laat ik bekennen, ik ben een liefhebber van Vlaamse hedendaagse architectuur. De culturele relevantie ervan werd 20 jaar geleden al erkend met de oprichting van het Vlaams Architectuurinstituut en...
The world is part baffled, part outright dismissive of the projects that are all over the media. They present an urban vision that starkly contrasts with conventional expectations, challenging...
It does not matter where you go these days. Everywhere, the lack of housing and the un-affordability are high up on the agenda. Platforms, workgroups, task forces, communities, societies,...
There is no shortage of plans. Masterplans, strategic visions, policy frameworks, pilot projects – they exist in abundance, often produced with impressive technical rigor and supported by international expertise....
Every year on April 27 (this year marks an exception and King’s Day is celebrated on April 26th because it’s never on a Sunday), the Netherlands transforms into a...
About every second book about cities starts with the announcement that we are now living in an urban age with more than 50 percent of the world population calling...
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,...
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.
