11. Juni 2024
The Dutch real estate fair PROVADA in Amsterdam took place for the 20th time this year – yet an occasion to mark ‘my anniversary’ of 30 years of activity in the Netherlands. You, dear business partners and colleagues, have made these uninterrupted three decades possible!
In a handy brochure, I review the milestone projects such as Brandevoort and De Resident in The Hague from the early years, too a highlight such as Vleuterweide Centrumgebied and show the current designs for Oranjekade Helmond and De IJ-Loods in Amsterdam NDSM. The early projects I realised together with my father-in-law Rob Krier, who passed away last year.
It was a great pleasure for us – Victor Joosten, partner in CKSA and representative in the Netherlands and myself – to meet you in person at PROVADA 2024 and present you with our small brochure containing 30 projects from 30 years.
Christoph Kohl
What we like doing best: Developing urban neighborhoods – for people.
Our professional passion is to build places where people feel at home. Home is more than a house, it includes the urban environment around it. The desire to build a place of belonging for other people is linked with our own self-imposed loss of home.
Most people in the international design team of CKSA live or have lived abroad for many years. Christoph Kohl has left his Italian ‘Heimat’ South Tyrol for the first time to study in Venice and Victor Joosten has lived outside his home country the Netherlands longer than he has lived in it.
We are convinced that home does not only exist where you come from, but home can also be designed and built. The urban designer and architect set the stage for the new feeling of home. When we do our job well, this has a great positive impact on the quality of life.
When a person, a couple or a family decides for a new domicile, whether it’s an apartment or a house, it should be an all-round fit. The urban environment is at least as important as the house itself. You only really feel at home when you look out of the window and see a place you feel comfortable in. That’s why there’s so much to be gained from curated urban design.
With this in mind the first project in the Netherlands was designed in 1994 with the small neighborhood ‘Noorderhof’ in Amsterdam and shortly afterwards in 1996 work commenced on the groundbreaking ‘Brandevoort’ settlement. The approach was different from the mainstream at the time and proved to be a great and lasting success.
From our office in Berlin we have remained active in the Netherlands ever since. In 2022, office partner Victor Joosten moved from Berlin to the Hague, Voorburg, enhancing our presence in the Netherlands.
Working in both Germany and the Netherlands has brought inspiration and cross fertilization of ideas in both directions. Working in different countries allows one to look beyond the common building practice and regulations to new horizons. Over the years there have also been intensive and interesting planning projects in China, Georgia and Russia.
To really create home, one has to have a hand in every stage of the design. This is why we provide services for all phases of planning – from the green (or brown) field site to the establishment of binding development plans and finally to the building design – with a competent, interdisciplinary team of partners and our office. This holistic approach of CKSA: Conception > master planning > legal planning > architectural design is our special business model.
Today, continuing to build our cities goes far beyond visually appealing architecture. The necessary responses to climate change, the use of renewable energy and managing mobility are increasingly turning us urban planners and architects into environmental specialists and sociologists – civil engineers in the literal sense. Those who design a sustainable, urban life for people can also – quite positively – create a home.
Berlin | Den Haag | Bolzano June 2024
