Stijn has more than twenty years of experience in designing and making our built environment. First as a carpenter, later as an engineer, and now as an architect.
He worked on large and unique projects for firms such as RAU, DOK, and BETA Architects.
As a carpenter
I believe in craft and the vernacular.
As an engineer
I believe in technology and the global.
As an architect
I believe in the power of ideas and stories we are told.
A Dries is a public green space in a village and often bordered by tall oak trees.
Historically, it served as common property where villagers gathered their herds.
The know-how of anonymous builders represents the largest untapped source of architectural inspiration in our digital era.
Making is a form of intelligence.
Our society values abstract activities but thinking also happens with our bodies.
Tinkering and modeling are indispensable tools in creating solutions and we love to make.
Imagination requires input. Dries postpone judgement and approach each project with an open mind.
We only consider solutions after we explore and analyse the site, the brief, and the clients.
Local - Tradional Ecological Knowledge
Lo-TEK was popularized by Julia Watson. It advocates multigenerational knowledge, practices, and beliefs. The philosophy challenges the notion that Indigenous innovation is primitive and exists in isolation from technology.
Dries applies Lo-TEK materials and uses it as a design philosophy.