François Chaslin Books

In November, Berlin welcomed a striking addition to its contemporary architecture with the new Dutch Embassy designed by OMA/Rem Koolhaas, located on the River Spree in former East Berlin. Koolhaas, celebrated for projects like the Kunsthal in Rotterdam and the villa in Bordeaux, showcases his design prowess with this embassy. The design is influenced by the city's stringent planning regulations, which mandate that every corner of a city block be developed. Koolhaas ingeniously incorporates a freestanding cube for the embassy at one corner, while the other corners feature an L-shaped block of three residences for embassy staff. A continuous spiral route serves as the central organizing element, connecting various embassy departments and offering new perspectives of both the building and the city. This publication includes sketches, drawings, and models that highlight the design's foundations, along with Koolhaas's insights on the project's context. Notably, German photographer Candida Höfer contributes her large-scale color photographs, capturing the embassy's exterior and interior, while Parisian architecture critic François Chaslin provides an analytical text.