(H/B) ARCHITECTURE IN THE NETHERLANDS - PHILIP JODIDIO

Dutch architecture and design are hot. Beneath an outward appearance of dullness or dryness lies an adventurous heart, and a willingness to go where few creators have gone before them. Rotterdam's own Rem Koolhaas (OMA) straddles the globe much like his huge new CCTV Tower will soon straddle Beijing, while his younger colleagues, such as Lars Spuybroek (NOX) imagine houses that sing and dance. Nor does Dutch inventiveness stop at pure architecture. Droog Design does furniture, and West 8 creates gardens all over the world. Though predictions are made regularly about the end of this "golden age" of Dutch architecture, each year brings a remarkable new crop of projects and completed buildings, confirming this small nation as one of the real creative leaders in Europe, if not the world. As Aaron Betsky, the director of the Netherlands Architecture Institute in Rotterdam wrote in his recent book False Flat, Why Dutch Design is so Good, "Dutch architects such as MVRDV are exporting the lessons they learned designing social housing all over the world, and Dutch industrial, graphic and furniture designers are picking up commissions in the United States, Europe and Asia. In the recent competition for redesigning Ground Zero in New York, three of the seven teams included Dutch architects... For a small country, the Netherlands exerts amazing influence." Nor is this positive attitude toward the Netherlands reserved to the already famous. Burton Hamfelt, a Canadian who is one of the principals of S 333, a young Amsterdam firm made up almost entirely of foreigners, says, "The Netherlands was a strategic choice to open an office for us; location, work climate, an enthusiastic design culture-our mixed backgrounds made this the most interesting location to also explore the world. The Netherlands is promoted as a kind of Hollywood for architects. If you want to become an actor, you go to Hollywood; if you want to become an architect, you come here. Even though the situation is clearly different now, there is still no other country where the design culture is omnipresent." Whether the best is yet to come is a moot point, in any case, Dutch architecture is here, now. (From the publisher)