The Berlage

Working within the European context, Office Winhov is constantly seeking the balance between maintaining a sense of history and continuity, with a strong urge for renewal. This tension between the arrière-garde and the avant-garde in architecture is being used and instrumentalized to define the current development of the city. And, as European norms and the desire for sustainable solutions only get stronger, the use and misuse of Critical Regionalism and the persisting Old vs. New debate will continue to affect the building culture. For this lecture, six recent projects in Amsterdam by Office Winhov are presented as a showcase for those seeking this balance while embracing architecture beyond aesthetic globalization.

Uri Gilad, co-founder and partner at Office Winhov, focuses on renovating and extending buildings of special historical significance, sustainable housing, and multifunctional projects at the intersection between hospitality, culture, and commerce. Developed with a careful understanding of context and an interest in material presence, his work incorporates the environmental, social, and cultural dimensions related to architecture and city planning. Uri graduated from the Amsterdam Academy of Architecture, where he obtained his Master’s Cum Laude under Prof. Herman Hertzberger. In 2016 he was nominated as a young architect for the Abe Bonnema Prijs and, in the same year, received the ARC16 Oeuvre Award for the work of Office Winhov. From 2021, Uri holds the position of architect member of Committee 1 (city center) of Amsterdam’s Spatial Quality Committee and is one of the editors of the yearbook Architecture in the Netherlands.