This lecture was recorded live in Istanbul as part of the RIBA + VitrA talks series and features a short introduction in Turkish followed by the lecture by Ben van Berkel in English.

UNStudio was founded by Ben van Berkel and Caroline Bos in 1988 and has grown into an international architectural design network with offices in Amsterdam, Shanghai, Hong Kong and Frankfurt. The Dutch architectural design studio specialises in a broad spectrum of industries spanning architecture, product design, urban development and infrastructure.

Key recent projects by the office include Raffles City, a multi-award winning mixed-use scheme in Hangzhou, China and Canaletto, a residential tower in London. Current projects include the design for Doha's Integrated Metro Network in Qatar, ‘Four’ a large-scale mixed-use project in Frankfurt and the Wasl Tower in Dubai.

Much of the work of the practice is led by a belief in future-proofing the design process by anticipating trends in practice and technology. In order to do this UNStudio has two research arms dedicated to expanding their understanding of every facet of the built to contribute to their mission of producing user-centric designs that are adaptive, resilient and future-proof. Alongside these two units, Ben van Berkel founded UNSense in 2018, an Arch Tech company that designs and integrates human-centric tech solutions for the built environment.

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