TU Delft & Quake welcome Tosin Oshinowo as the new Jaap Oosterhoff Visiting Professor

16 February 2026

Constraints, creativity, and a new architectural mindset

Oshinowo’s experience working in Lagos, Nigeria, one of the world’s fastest‑growing cities, has shaped a design philosophy rooted in creativity. Limited resources, inexpensive materials and infrastructural gaps encouraged her to rethink what architecture can be, proving that constraints can unlock innovative ways of thinking and working. She sees these conditions not as unique to Lagos, but as indicative of global challenges: scarcity of resources, climate pressures, and the urgent need to reconsider the assumptions behind architectural production. In her interactions with Delft students, she hopes to foster this mindset: teaching them to embrace boundaries as a catalyst for their creativity and societal ambition. Her goal is to help cultivate a new generation of architects who understand responsibility and creativity as two sides of the same coin.

 

Gentle modernity

Central to Oshinowo’s vision is what she calls gentle modernity: an approach to architecture that resists the extractive habits of consumerism and instead embraces adaptability, context, and care. She urges architects to see value in what is often considered waste, to move beyond circularity as a technical strategy and toward a cultural one. Her research on the self‑organising marketplaces of Lagos illustrates how local systems can create resilient forms of urban life without top‑down planning, and how the built environment can support rather than override self-organisation. Oshinowo advocates for design that not only reduces harm but contributes positively: architecture that goes far beyond no carbon emissions and adds ecological and social value. In Delft, she hopes to explore how these principles can spark new ways of thinking about cities worldwide.

 

Read more about Oshinowo’s work on the website of Oshinowo Studio.

 

Collaboration between practice and science to solve tomorrow's questions

The Jaap Oosterhoff Visiting Professor program is an initiative of the Architectural Engineering & Technology (AE&T) department at TU Delft, in collaboration with Oosterhoff and the innovation think tank Quake. Each year, an international expert is invited to give guest lectures, workshops, and public presentations within the Building Technology master's track. The themes are current and urgent: from circular construction to digital innovation and nature-inclusive design. The chair is led by Ulrich Knaack (TU Delft) and Jaap Wiedenhoff (Quake). Together, they ensure an inspiring interaction between academia and practice.

 

"Gather the best specialists and generalists"

The program is named after Jaap Oosterhoff, who founded his own engineering firm in Arnhem in 1953 – the beginning of what later became ABT and Oosterhoff. His vision was progressive: building a society in which people live in harmony with their environment. This idea still forms the core of the program.

 

As Jaap Wiedenhoff puts it:

 

"To answer the complex issues of today and the future, we need more understanding, experience & exploration. Gather the best specialists and generalists. Let go of standards. Ask the right questions. Only then can we create a society in which people can flourish."

 

With Oshinowo’s arrival, the programme gains a powerful voice that strengthens its mission to bridge academic knowledge and practical innovation, empowering future architects to design with responsibility, creativity and societal impact.

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