UNSTUDIO
EST AMSTERDAM AS VAN BERKEL &
BOS ARCHITECTUURBUREAU IN 1988,
RE-BRANDED TO UNSTUDIO IN 1998
BEN VAN BERKEL, CO-FOUNDER
“
WE DIDN’T ONLY CHANGE
THE NAME, BUT ALSO
ADAPTED THE WAY THAT
WE WERE ORGANISED TO
CORRESPOND WITH A NEW
MODEL [OF WORKING]..
CHANGING THE NAME
OF THE PRACTICE ALSO
GENERATED A NEW FORM
OF COLLABORATIVE
STRATEGY
‘In 1988 when Caroline Bos and I originally
founded our practice it was called the van Berkel
& Bos Architectuurbureau. However we noticed
at the time that the practice of architecture was
fundamentally changing and that as an office we
were in fact organised in a way that was in some
respects too traditional.
‘We wanted to break away from both the atelier
and the corporate model of architectural practice
and to instead invent a new form of collaborative
network practice which would operate in an
interactive way on different scales. For this
reason we decided to change the name of the
practice in 1998 to UNStudio – United Network
Studio.
‘We didn’t only change the name, but also
adapted the way that we were organised to
correspond with this new model. This in turn
meant more leadership van Berkel & Bos – now
UNStudio – co-founder Ben van Berkel was
required and as a result we now have three
partners in the rm. So changing the name
of the practice also generated a new form of
collaborative strategy.
‘This was done in order to be more compact,
more interactive and parametric and to
facilitate outsourcing and knowledge sharing.
We wanted the office to function as an adaptive
machine that constantly and exibly performs
with new techniques for design according to a
network model.
‘In 1998 we were strongly advised not to
change the name of the practice, after having
spent more than 10 year creating the ‘brand’.
But thankfully the gamble paid off and actually
we couldn’t have imagined at the time what a
successful effect it would have. Now of course
the complex