Some buildings are given nicknames by the public. These can be positive, like Sir Norman Foster’s ‘Gherkin’ in London or Herzog & de Meuron‘s ‘Bird’s Nest’ in Beijing. However, sometimes nicknames carry a negative connotation like the ‘Peperclip’ housing project in Rotterdam designed by famous Dutch architect, Carel Weeber. Positive or negative, the adage “Better to be talked about than not at all” rings true.

We architects always create architecture in the public realm, yet some designs are more obvious than others. The project De Nooterhof and its nickname, ‘The Monopoly House’, gives a quirkiness to the city of Zwolle. The nickname is an honor.

The ‘Monopoly House’ nickname was first coined in a local newspaper, referring to the nature education center we’d built in the nature education and leisure park The Nooterhof in Zwolle.

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Sitec Studio designed this building in a urban landscape plan we developed for our Landstede client.

The urban/landscape plan creates a combination of nature education buildings, a school and a museum within an revitalized nature education park with fields, forest and water. The school (C), the Museum (E) and the new bridge (11) have not been built.

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