Project 2B: Scale and Models OMA, Rem Koolhaas

4 min readMay 13, 2018

Rem Koolhaas, the renowned Architect, is the founder of OMA (the Office for Metropolitan Architecture) which is based in Rotterdam. The company was initiated in 1975 by Koolhaas and few other architects, however, they were constantly misunderstood and judged for their approach for architecture. Rem Koolhaas not only believed that an architect is the person who floats between reality and imagination, he also is the ‘conscious collector, manipulator and projector of images’(Betsky and Patteeuw 2003). Koohlaas reigns his firm with one very important concept which is to avoid the limitation of the firm’s self-defined goal to the construction of buildings. The architect in OMA should progressively gather and find data and information that will help him/her understand architecture not in form, but in reasoning and prognosis. The architectural outcome of Koolhaas is neither purely rational, nor purely fictional, but it is rather perfectly mythical. His architecture is more than what the public expects and convinces the viewer instantly by its aesthetic. Betsky and Patteeuw (2003) believe that Koolhaas ‘liberated architecture from place, from materiality, without letting it disappear into nothing.’ OMA has finalized and done models for 59 museums, 42 towers, 9 libraries, and many more projects.

Pictures of the iterations and final model of Jussieu Library

In 1992, The two Jussieu Libraries in Paris were a basic and specific outcome of the mythical concept of Koolhaas. Since it is cold and empty around the area where the libraries are built, Koolhaas’s construction is a way to create a kind of “warm” vibe. These two libraries consist of slabs and columns that Koolhaas and his team used to initiate a building that is radically different from what a person would usually relate a library to. This library’s construction takes account of what Le Corbusier initial concept of the stairs, and recreates it in a much larger perspective. The floors slide into the walls. The rooms slide between the floors. The void between the levels and slabs is another very important idea that Koolhaas highlights in the Jussieu Library. This void is generally considered by Koolhaas as a latent force contained between these layers that blocks direct visions some time, and reveals hidden elements some other time.

When I started with my iterations, I wanted to master the grid system which is generally there to support the slabs. For the first few ones, it was quite hard to create a perfect grid. As you can see in the images below the columns are not straight and there are very few of them too.

However when I reached my two final iterations, I created a grid on the computer and printed it out so that I end up with a perfect alignment of the columns. For the very first iterations, I used wood and paper to learn how to create Koohlaas’s model of the Jussieu Libraries. In these iterations, the columns were cut so that I could stick them in an easier manner. However, upon reaching the last two iterations, I made sense of all the mistakes that I’ve done: a lot more columns were integrated in the design, balsa wood was used instead of paper, the columns were integrated as is and not cut into parts, a printed out grid system was used, and a glue gun was used instead of the UHU glue for higher sustainability. Smaller openings in the slabs were made to create the same look and vision of that of the Jussieu’s model.

When it came to my final model, I was so cautious with the material I used and glued everything with accuracy. i made sure to work very hardly on the grid because it is the secret of succeeding in this project.