Legendary Dutch architect has no regrets about Russia projects

POZNAŃ, Poland — Rem Koolhaas, the acclaimed Dutch architect and theorist, has courted controversy by equivocating on the EU’s current attitude to Russia, claiming that institutional Europe “almost blindly followed America” and paid the price in a new cold war. 

“We have become more and more negative about Russia, and we have ignored Russia when we could have a dialogue,” Koolhaas — who ranks as Europe’s most prominent architect for his work on prestige projects across the globe — said in a wide-ranging interview.

During an discussion at the Impact’25 business conference in Poznań, Koolhaas defended his decision to design the Garage art gallery in Moscow — led by Dasha Zhukova, then-wife of the now-sanctioned billionaire businessman Roman Abramovich — and to take part in a conference to boost Moscow’s urban design in 2018, where President Vladimir Putin was the other star guest.

Asked by POLITICO if he regretted the choice to work in Russia, Koolhaas shot back: “If I thought it was a mistake I wouldn’t have done it and even now in retrospect I think it would be right. We created a potential (in Garage) which is currently not used, but it was good to create that potential and maybe some day, it will be — that potential is still there.”

He added that “dialogue with Russia and Russians” was a more promising route to healing division between Moscow and the West — and claimed that following an American model of attempts at spreading democracy to the old East had proved flawed.

“There has been a disconnect,” Koolhaas said, “Europe wanted to absorb the old countries of the east into a larger entity and it had almost obsessive vision and aim to do this.  But it forgot to seriously communicate with others other than Europeans. I think we almost blindly followed America. We have become more and more negative about Russia and we have ignored Russia when we could have a dialogue.”

Pressed on whether he would engage with Russia now, given Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine that began in February 2022 and shows no sign of abating, Koolhaas responded: “Not now, but one day when this [war] is over. There are ways to talk to Russians without only talking to Putin.”