DKV Architecten has its base in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. The architectural office was founded in 1984 as Dobbelaar, de Kovel, de Vroom Architekten, and is currently led by the partners Roel Bosch, Herman de Kovel and Paul de Vroom. It has now expanded into a medium-sized architectural firm.
DKV’s field of operation ranges from housing construction and urban development to miscellaneous forms of commercial and industrial building. In the course of time, the company has realized a substantial number of projects within these domains, where complex issues frequently arise and require efficient and adequate responses.
By applying an analytical working method, based on thinking in terms of models, the office is capable of translating restrictive preconditions into opportunities, which results in unexpected solutions. The work of DKV is characterized by the power of simplicity. The designs are striking in their clarity of organization and appearance. DKV orients its effort to penetrating to the core of the issue and to providing an apposite response to the assignment by means of an original plan that is simultaneously surprising and self-evident.
The essence of the design is consistently applied at all scale levels, from the urban development right down to the technical details. In present-day society, design processes are continuously subject to change and are therefore largely unpredictable. Accordingly, as a design factor, flexibility plays a major role within the work of DKV.
DKV is a tight collective that operates in a team setup, where the different team members, with their own backgrounds and experiences, supplement and stimulate one another. The organizational basis consists of a concept team, two office teams, and a technical team. A project team is compiled for each project and care is taken to ensure that all the expertise and capacity necessary for the assignment is represented. The partners fulfil a key role in the design process. If specific knowledge or exceptional support is required, DKV can appeal to a network of established relations with which the company regularly and satisfactorily co-operates.
