Mecanoo’s projects are ‘spatial poems’ that transform everyday places into humane architecture that touches all the senses. Including texts and stories by the celebrated architecture critic Herbert Wright, stunning photography, and inspiring illustrations, this publication provides a comprehensive portrait of one of the world’s most extraordinary architecture offices to date.

Prof.ir. Dick van Gameren, Partner at Mecanoo/Design and Research Director has been engaged in housing design for the past twenty-five years through his practice and in his research and teaching at Delft University of Technology. In Dutch Dwellings, he presents around forty of his own projects, grouped into thematic chapters to illustrate the main underlying principles of residential design. 

Mecanoo’s early housing projects revealed the strong social agenda they have as “they forge a trail through people, place and purpose to poetry” through their designs, described in an essay by founding partner, Francine Houben. This publication provides a comprehensive review of Mecanoo works in the last 3 decades divided into 2 distinct sections – the first is a foundation of projects by Mecanoo in their native country, and the second features works that define their influence outside of the Netherlands.

The work of Mecanoo is featured at AV Proyectos with a total of ten projects covering different typologies, from leisure to infrastructure and office to educational. This selection presents projects currently under construction as well as competition designs with reflect our design principles.

Projects featured: Sports Complex Mondorf-les-Bains, Ede Wageningen Train Station, Manchester Engineering Campus, Grand Central, Frankfurt am Main, Futian Civic Cultural Center, Qianhai Data Center, Hengli International Headquarters, Konka Group Headquarters, Taiwan National Archive and the Taichung Green Corridor.

Inspiration and Process in Architecture is a series of monographs on key figures in modern and contemporary architecture. It offers the reading of the practice of design which emphasises the value of freehand drawing as part of the creative process. Each volume provides a different perspective, revealing secrets and insights and showing the various observation techniques, languages, characters, forms and means of communication.

People Place Purpose describes the specific architecture that Mecanoo explores, illustrating the way they seek for identity in a globalised world. From the texture of a local stone, to colours of a fruit tree or rituals of inhabitants, Mecanoo is driven to design buildings with strength to earth. A total of seventeen projects, all built in mutually different conditions, show the world according to Mecanoo.

Dutch Mountains is more than a book about architecture. It's about beautiful buildings, all over the world, Dutch designed. It's about a woman who has remained herself in the wonderful and challenging world of international architecture. It's about the unparalleled success of the still idealistically motivated architects, Delft-based architects, Mecanoo.

Journalist Jan Tromp and photographer Harry Cock capture the world of Francine Houben in eight special projects in five different countries.

This booklet accompanies the exhibition ‘A People's Palace’ presenting recent projects by Mecanoo at Aedes (Berlin). Over the past three decades, Mecanoo’s highly multidisciplinary approach has resulted in a wide-ranging portfolio of designs that are realised with technical expertise and great attention to detail.

Besides the Library of Birmingham, the Municipal offices and Train Station in Delft, the Kaap Skill Museum on Texel, the National Kaohsiung Center for the Arts (Wei-Wu-Ying), and the Bruce C. Bolling Municipal Building in Boston are among the projects which make part of this booket.
 

In Revisions of Space, architect Dick van Gameren shows how the spatial quality of architecture is connected with densification and programmatic diversity: in buildings, around buildings and in the urban context. He does this by using a selection of unusual historic examples and his own work.

The book could be described as a manual for architecture - how one can look at architecture and how, as a designer, to deal with it - as well as a personal appeal for more consideration for one of the essential components of architecture.

An international jury chose the design of Mecanoo because of its great imagination, one-ness of the arts center with the park, modern theatre techniques and incorporation of the subtropical climate. This book follows the design process and the engineer complexity that a project with this scale demands.

The memorable visit of the King and Queen of Spain on March 23rd 2010, marks the five year period which began in spring 2005 with the winning competition design for La Llotja de Lleida: a large stone complex which seems as if sprouted from the Spanish earth.

An event square begins underneath the great cantilevers, and the stairs of the adjacent building serve as a tribune. The main auditorium has walls of black wood in which trees of light have been cut out, inspired by the fruit orchards of the region.

The new AMOLF laboratory building was opened on March 18th, 2010 by NWO chairman Jos Engelen.

Dick van Gameren architects published a book about the development of the new AMOLF lab.

Wei wu ying yi shu wen hua zhong xin chou jian shi lu, 2009. 369 pag. (some col.), ports, 23 cm.

In the spring of 2008 the latest monograph about Mecanoo was published. The book demonstrates through word and image a cross section of Mecanoo architecten's broad oeuvre.

Mecanoo's projects show a passion for landscapes, a pleasure in technology and an undogmatic approach of each assignment.

Text: Ruud Brouwers, Aaron Betsky. Design: Via Vermeulen/ b+w and colour illustrations/ hardback/ 272 pages / 300x223 mm

The book examines 24 buildings and projects that illustrate Mecanoo's contribution to the creation of new types of collective residences-those geared toward integrating functions other than those of mere living within the home.

This extensively illustrated presentation vividly conveys the experimental and functional aspects of Mecanoo's unique vision and offers an affordable introduction to their work.

This book was published because of the opening of the new RC Chapel St Mary of the Angels for the cemetery St Lawrence in Rotterdam.

It contains texts from varies sources: three dissertations regarding the architecture of the chapel, a dissertation of the polyptych that decorates the rear wall of the choir and the sermon that the bishop gave for the consecration of the chapel.

The book is illustrated with pictures of Christian Richters and Jeroen Toirkens.

This impressive publication explores the impact of mobility on our daily lives, examines how mobility relates to city and landscape, and reveals the consequences for the contemporary culture of design.

Documenting the first International Architecture Biennale Rotterdam, of which Francine Houben was director/curator, this book brings together the contributions of university researchers, architects, urban designers, spatial planners and designers.

The well-known cartoonist Joost Swarte designed the new Toneelschuur theatre in the historic city centre of Haarlem in his own characteristic style. Mecanoo elaborated his outline drawing and turned his sketch into a functional building.

This book documents the unique and experimental project with sketches, drawings and photographs of the building, interior and many details.

Mecanoo architecten, Holland Avenue, Research Road Atlas; Holland Avenue, Design Road Atlas, Publ. Ministry of Transport, Public Works and Water Management, The Hague 2003 (English).

In the book 'Composition, Contrast, Complexity'  Francine Houben presents a personal account of her experiences.

Text and image convey her original and authentic attitude, views and feelings about architecture. She has made a selection from her many Mecanoo projects for this publication. Each of these projects is exemplary of her vision and illustrates the three core elements of how she conceives architecture: composition, contrast and complexity.

In 1998-2000 Mecanoo renovated and extended office villa Maliebaan 16 in Utrecht. Jannes Linders photograped the result. Houben, Francine/Mecanoo architecten, Maliebaan 16, een huis om in te werken, Publ. Andersson Elffers Felix, Mecanoo architecten, Utrecht/Delft 2000.

The terrain of Delft Technical University reflects the ideas of the sixties of the previous century – optimistic, large-scale, mainly isolated buildings situated along a long wide axis, with no public space of any significance. 

It is based on the notion of ‘integrated engineering’, with a multidisciplinary approach to the different faculty courses.

The Master Plan creates the spatial conditions for the University in which Technology, innovation, education, research and the social application of all these aspects will in future increasingly converge.

The central library of Delft Technical University had to become the technical library of the Netherlands, linked by the latest electronic devices to libraries all over the world. 

This book tells the history of this extraordinary library in sketches, drawings, photos and texts.
 

Since building the award winning design for social housing on Rotterdam's Kruisplein (1985) Mecanoo has been working steadily at an extensive oeuvre whose combination of idealism, pragmatism and sense of beauty is breathing new life into the modern tradition.

It sets out to document in a surveyable form the work of Dutch architects with an impressive body of work behind them.