The position of architecture in the early 21st century is controversial and thus the form of buildings that aspire to convey meaning is often convoluted. If a building is to succeed it must be a monster: something unknowable, animal, and yet vaguely familiar, as if it had risen out of our deepest unconscious. It must be bigger and stranger than we are, and yet a mirror of our hopes and fears. This is the position that has been maintained by Ben van Berkel, Caroline Bos and their firm--now known as UNStudio--for the last fifteen years. In an era in which investment in an autonomous monumental object would seem like financial, moral and intellectual folly, these architects have been making the argument for strong, folded, warped and inverted forms as a condenser of economic resources as well as of concrete. They see buildings as place-holders as well as containers of spatial labyrinths, and as iconic forms as well as unknowable shapes...

Introduction

Electrical Substation in Amersfoort

Karbouw Offices

Erasmus Bridge

Villa Wilbrink

M6bius House

Bascule Bridge & Bridge Master’s House

Het Valkhof Museum

Chapel in Hilversum

NMR Facility

Electrical Substation in Innsbruck

Prince Claus Bridge

Water Villas

La Defense Offices

Living Tomorrow Pavilion

Hotel Castell

VilLA NM

Mercedes-Benz Museum

Galleria Department Store

Agora Theater

Tea House on Bunker

Current projects

Partners and Projects

Map

Bibliography/Credits/The author