Page 8 - Fall_2017

ArchDC Fall 2017.qxp_Fall 2017 8/10/17 1:06 PM Page 6

Contributors

Steven K. Dickens, AIA, LEED AP
(“Home is Where the Innovation Is” and
“Democracy Lives in Light”), is senior
associate with Eric Colbert & Associates.

Peter James, AIA, LEED AP BD+C
(“Starting Up in Woodridge”), is an
associate with Perkins Eastman DC.

Denise Liebowitz (“The Medium is
the Message” and “Design at Work”),
formerly with the National Capital
Planning Commission, is a regular
contributor to ARCHITECTUREDC.

G. Martin Moeller, Jr., Assoc. AIA
(“This Side of the Tracks” and “Taking
the Office for a Spin”) is an independent
curator and writer, as well as senior curator
Photo by Ana del Castillo / Shutterstock.com
at the National Building Museum. He
De Rotterdam building (at right), Rotterdam, The Netherlands, by OMA.
is the editor of ARCHITECTUREDC.
One of those Red Star Line emigrants was a five-year-old named Israel Isidore
Ronald O’Rourke (“Every Story Has
Baline. He later changed his name to Irving Berlin and became one of America’s greatest
Two Sides” and “Slipped Right In”) is a
songwriters, penning “God Bless America,” among other famous tunes. One of his pianos
regular contributor to ARCHITECTUREDC.
is on display at the museum.
His father, Jack O’Rourke, was an
Reading Berlin’s story and others at the museum was a deeply meaningful way to
architect in San Francisco for more than
celebrate the Fourth. I was in Belgium, but for me and my husband (whose family on his
four decades.
mother’s side emigrated from Eastern Europe in the early 20th century), it was a very
American moment.
We were in Antwerp that day as a side trip from Rotterdam, The Netherlands, and as
it turns out, our hotel in Rotterdam was built on the site of a similar point of departure,
this time for the Holland America line. The hotel takes up part of a large mixed-use
building, called De Rotterdam, which was designed by Rem Koolhaas and also completed
in 2013. Intended as a vertical neighborhood of 5,000 people, the complex also includes
apartments, offices, and restaurants. It has become Rotterdam’s most iconic structure,
even more than the nearby Erasmusbrug, the modern cable-stayed bridge over
Rotterdam’s Nieuwe Maas River. The views from our hotel room toward the bridge, the
river, and the city beyond were breathtaking.
With more than 1.7 million square feet of space, De Rotterdam is the largest building
in the Netherlands. And at 44 floors, it is much taller than anything in Washington. Even
so, our infamous J. Edgar Hoover FBI headquarters building, with only one-quarter as
many floors, is even larger, with 2.8 million square feet of floor space. At this writing,
with the project to move the FBI headquarters to a new site having been cancelled, it now
looks like we will have live with what our editor has called “the swaggering bully of the
neighborhood” for some time to come.
Elsewhere in the city, however, new office buildings are being built, and this issue of
ARCHITECTUREDC focuses on showing you several recent examples. We hope you enjoy
reading about them. Thanks for all your kind comments on the last issue, and we look
forward to hearing from you.

Mary Fitch, AICP, Hon. AIA
Publisher
mfitch@aiadc.com

6 WELCOME