Last time I saw him speak it was a huge disappointment.

Doing some boring housing blocks where he claims to sway the developers to hybridize the program and he still shows sections of the building with big capitalized words, stretched and squeezed, for program elements.

at least he broke away from his channel-glass fetish....

true that.

I saw him some weeks ago at berlage "evening lecture series". he had cool project for europol headquaters in den haag and a small art gallery with chicken farm and greenhouse integrated... it was fun to listen, and I found everything interesting, since I'm not so familiar with his work.

website is www.wielarets.nl, but there's not much content.

the project with the chickens is nice, yes.

I had the opportunity to both hear him lecture and have dinner with him afterward, and I really have to question all the negativity here (Javier). While true his work can be a bit heavy-handed, I don't see how you can dismiss his "claims" regarding the hybridization of the program--look at the drawings (yes, with all those nice capitals), it's done. He has successfully integrated sophisticated architectural programming and form with an appeal to business practices and office praxis. I would think that any among us would be thrilled to be doing the kind of work Arets is. Maybe I'm wrong, and maybe it was just the wine that night at dinner...

Having poked around the police station in Vaals and the KNSM Island residential tower I have formed the opinion that Arets only avoids the label of kitsch by use of mercilessly cold, hard materials and empty vistas. The approach paths, to give one blatant example, are ridiculously circuitous. At one time his rationality about building systems and skeletons interested me, but I was turned off enough by experiencing his buildings to not even want to introduce myself at the Berlage.