Cities and their making understood and sometimes imagined .
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 benchmark enough municipalities, urban development would become more efficient, rational, and successful. Today, cities are drowning in indicators: Smart City...
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 benchmark enough municipalities, urban development would become more efficient, rational, and successful. Today, cities are drowning in indicators: Smart City...
Yesterday the results of the international ideas competition for Berlin and Brandenburg 2070 was announced. The competition was explicitly branded as a tool to develop a future vision of...
Why urban economies, cultural traditions and scale produce different political outcomes Populism has become the defining political mood of the West. From Trumpism in the United States to Brexit,...
Revisiting Doxiadis Through a Book and the Reality of Riyadh This reflection begins with a Christmas present. A book I had been looking for for quite some time, and...
The world feels restless. The signs are everywhere: rivers that once defined borders are running dry, billionaires are building rockets while public schools crumble, and the internet that once...
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...
Currently, I am preparing a lecture series which will look at the differences between the global north and the global south within the same continent. In Asia, you have...
For more than thirty years, China’s property sector functioned not merely as an economic engine but as a governing mechanism. Housing construction stabilized local finances, absorbed surplus capital, and...
In the vast desert sands of Saudi Arabia, an audacious experiment captured the imagination of urbanists, technologists, and futurists worldwide. NEOM’s “The Line” — a proposed 170-kilometer-long linear city...
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...
Europe has been praised for its cities. Wherever I go in the world I get the same stereotypic answers when asking people for their favourite places: “Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin,...
Take a journey. Not a comfortable one.
In July this year, the online portal ‘common edge’ asked: “Does architecture have a “fake news” problem?” In their article they make a case against the growing compartmentalization of...
An interpretive essay on the performative linguistics of contemporary planning practice Decoding the Dialect of Planning Urban planning is, among many things, a language. A curious mix of optimism,...
Many urban planners have developed a habit they rarely question: the reflex to load every project with every possible virtue. Sustainability, resilience, inclusivity, net zero, circularity, walkability, car-free living,...
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...
When Chancellor Merz spoke of the “Stadtbild,” he turned an architectural term into a moral mirror — and revealed more than he intended. Some words lead quiet lives. They...
What unites and separates those who plan cities across the world The great blessing – and sometimes curse – of a globally operating business is that I get the...
At RIXARCH 2026 in Riga, I my lecture [LIV]-[IN], the Hyphen between housing and living, I spoke about the expansion of living beyond housing and the architectural question of public space. The lecture explores how living developed from a single location housing into a multi-location practice where we use different places during different times of […]
At RIXARCH 2026 in Riga, I my lecture [LIV]-[IN], the Hyphen between housing and living, I spoke about the expansion of living beyond housing and the architectural question of...
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.
