Matthijs Bouw is the Dutch founder of One Architecture and Urbanism (ONE), an award-winning Amsterdam and New York-based firm. ONE is a global leader in the use of design to conceive and advance climate adaptation and waterfront masterplanning projects, combining infrastructure design with nature-based solutions projects to create exceptional places. He is a Professor of Practice at UPenn’s Weitzman School.
Bouw successfully led or co-led design teams for Rebuild by Design, the Resilient Bay Area Challenge, Water as Leverage (Semarang) and Vancouver’s Sea2City, demonstrating a unique ability to leverage design as a central tool for navigating complex challenges and for early project identification.
Bouw and his team are planning for long-term sea level rise in the Netherlands, the US, the UK and Indonesia, and are currently implementing multiple projects for Manhattan’s coastal resilience. His pioneering work has led to many follow-up projects, and has inspired governments, communities, IFIs, and developers to re-imagine planning and developing infrastructure such that it can be more future-proof, community-centered, multi-functional, and make better use of nature-based solutions.
He is the co-editor of Building with Nature: Creating, Implementing and Scaling Nature-based Solutions (nai010publishers, 2020). In 2022, his book Managing the Climate Crisis: Designing and Building for Floods, Heat, Drought, and Wildfire (co-authored with Jonathan Barnett) was published by Island Press.
- Founder and President, ONE Architecture & Urbanism
- Professor of Practice, McHarg Center Fellow for Risk and Resilience, Weitzman School of Design, University of Pennsylvania
September 26 @ 5:00 pm – 7:00 pm
It’s Complicated: New York’s 400-year Relationship with its Waterfront