23 December 2022

VMX Office Amsterdam will be closed for one week, we will be back on 2nd January 2023.

15 November 2022 

“Iconic buildings in Eindhoven? Sure, but as an exception, not as a rule.”

EINDHOVEN - Don Murphy is the new supervisor of the gigantic building plans in the city center and the Fellenoord area in Eindhoven. “As a conductor, I want to help make plans better, I am not a policeman.” Important here: the architect wants to remain completely independent.

Designing iconic buildings in Eindhoven should be the exception rather than the rule. And it's not just about the separate buildings, but above all about the cohesion, about the entire area. Green plays an increasingly important role in this.

So says Don Murphy (57), the new supervisor for the city center and the Fellenoord area at the municipality of Eindhoven. He succeeds Winy Maas and Kees Christiaanse. The new supervisor supervises the building plans of developers, corporations and their architects in the city center and around the Fellenoord. Common thread in Murphy's buildings As an architect, Murphy and his office VMX designed a variety of buildings, such as a VIP hall for passengers of private planes at Schiphol, the building The Pulse in the commercial Zuidas in Amsterdam and the award-winning Haasje Over at Strijp-S.

What is the common thread in those buildings?
“I believe that the built city influences our behavior, positively and negatively. When we open the door here, we meet our neighbor and say hello. It's different when we're in our car, that's one of those containers, then you don't meet anyone. Communities can also emerge more easily in cities. But you have to make as few closed building blocks as possible and you have to bring people together. You have a role in that as an architect. Then you can still make beautiful architecture,” says Murphy in English.

The born Irishman has been studying, working and living in the Netherlands for years and he understands everything. "But my Dutch is 'horrible', my children say." He pronounces the word 'horrible' horribly badly in Dutch.

Striking is the building The Pulse on the Zuidas, where office towers predominate. People also had to live there. How important is that, also in Eindhoven, at KnoopXL? “I fundamentally believe in densification of the existing city. We use more and more space. We must ask ourselves how we deal responsibly with land use. That is why we should not build in the green area, but build in high density. But with a lot of green. We need to bring nature into the city.” "It's not lip service, but it really is. Because people love the city and nature,” he adds.

His own house also demonstrates that principle. On his phone he shows a photo of the modern villa in nature near the Amstel: there is hardly a wall to be seen, because the house is completely overgrown with ivy. "Walk the talk," Murphy calls it: do what you say.

Why then do you take the step to supervisor, where you have to look over the shoulder of architects and assess their work?
“That stemmed from the crisis in 2008, to be honest. We were working on residential products, image quality plans, but I think there was much more creative potential in architects.” He then started working as a supervisor for the municipality of Amsterdam and for Schiphol.

How do you see your role?
,,I feel like the conductor of the orchestra who helps his musicians – architect and developer – to get the best out of it. I'm not going to rewrite the music. I don't start from my ideas, but I want to encourage the municipality to take some risks with the design of buildings. And pushing the developers and my colleagues to deliver more quality.”

Can those three supervisor jobs be combined?
“I like to work, I don't often take holidays. So it is possible to free up two days a week for Eindhoven. I also think this is a beautiful city for that. Although sometimes you have to look closely where the valuable buildings and spaces are. I have already learned that.” Murphy wants to stay long. ,,A supervisor has to be the constant factor for a long time. I go for that one hundred percent, to make a difference in developing the city.”

Of course he realizes that as a supervisor he will certainly not always make friends. “Because I will also have to say from time to time that a design is really not possible. Although I don't want to be a policeman, I want to be very reasonable and not challenge everything. Choose your battles, choose what you want to fight for, I say. But there are also limits.”

“That is only possible if I manage to maintain my total independence. I have to work for the sake of the piece of the city we are making. That's why I really can't work as an architect on projects in the city center or on Fellenoord. That's not allowed and I don't want that. I will not make developers pay lunch just yet to remain independent.” In doing so, he takes a radically different position than his predecessor in the inner city, Winy Maas. He thought it could be combined, as long as others judged his own design. The city council eventually ruled otherwise and the flamboyant Rotterdam architect cleared the field.

The Legacy of His Predecessors
But Murphy still has to work with his legacy: the densification plan for the inner city. Also with that of Kees Christiaanse, who did the supervision around the Fellenoord and the station and wrote down the vision, by the way. The two supervisors were polar opposites: the austere Christiaanse and the (according to Murphy) 'exuberant' Maas. “I hope I am the right person to bring both visions closer together. Cities are not made by exceptional buildings, but by buildings that work together. There is always room for icons, but as an exception. We need to build good buildings and not just exceptions for the sake of exceptions.” It also sounds that things could be a bit more frivolous around the Fellenoord. That will happen when the new supervisor moves a little more towards the Maas. According to Christiaanse's principles, the redevelopment of that area would lead to sleek architecture, such as at The Social Hub (formerly The Student Hotel) or Edge on Stationsweg. Incidentally, Christiaanse supervises the District-E and Lichthoven building plans around the station because they are already so advanced.

Murphy also wants to be a "bonding agent" between the two areas now separated by the high track. The new area around the Fellenoord must become part of the city center through the building plans that are being developed. “It is not yet too late to merge that area into the city center, because the plans are now being made. We also have to work together with Adriaan Geuze, supervisor of Strijp-S.”

“What I noticed in my first six weeks is that developers and architects are very receptive to ideas: there is no resistance to working together. For example, on Stadhuisplein (where the four parties who develop plans work on harmonizing their ideas, ed.) You can see that they really want to.”

“Eindhoven is also a city that has great potential to make something of it. More like Rotterdam than Amsterdam, everything is already fixed there because the entire city is a monument. Still, I also want to be careful in Eindhoven with what we remove. You also have to talk about that. Because you have few very old monuments here, the reconstruction period has also produced many interesting buildings. You should definitely keep that.” Furthermore, Murphy emphasizes that densification of the city does not only mean building functional and beautiful buildings. That is really a matter of area development, creating cohesion between buildings and public space, with lots of greenery. “We really need to create an area. This also has added value for the developer of a building, if it is part of a shared ecosystem. Then the building also improves, it increases the value. I see that there are many players in Eindhoven who really want to develop the city. More than in Amsterdam, for example, you also see local entrepreneurs at work here.”

Four people on urban planning for big city
Murphy does note, just like his predecessor Maas five years ago, that the city's urban development department has a serious capacity problem. “There are still only four people, and that for such a large city. That is why we can often only respond to plans and not work proactively: ideally you would study a part of the city and then advise the owners on how to develop it. That is not possible now.”