Rem D Koolhaas on Founding United Nude, Making a 3D-Printed Shoe, and Why Pencil and Paper Are Still His Most Important Tools
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This is the latest installment of our Core77 Questionnaire. Previously, we talked to Umbra co-founder Paul Rowan.
Name: Rem D Koolhaas
Occupation: I’m a designer and the creative director of United Nude.
Location: I’m based in Guangzhou, China; that’s where we have our studio. But I also spend a lot of time abroad. We have showrooms in Amsterdam and New York, and we have shops all around the world. And then I spend the weekends in Hong Kong.
Current projects: We’re a seasonal business, so we’re designing a new collection every few months. Right now we are also making what I would call an “art car”—it’s basically a sculpture that you drive around, which is almost finished. In addition, we’re doing a 3D-printing project with 3D Systems, where we designed a shoe for very small-volume 3D printers. That was launched at our store in New York earlier this month.
Mission: To make cool products, and along the way try new things and push boundaries. To be inspired and inspire others.
United Nude’s 3D-printed Float shoe launched earlier this month. Top image: Koolhaas and the Biospiracy boot. Portrait by Rosanne Lowit
When did you decide that you wanted to be a designer? Well, I come from a family with a lot of designers. My uncle is an architect with the same name as me. My father was also an architect and my mother was a graphic artist. So I think I wanted to be an architect like my father basically from the very beginning.
Education: I have a master’s degree in architecture from the Technical University of Delft in Holland.
First design job: While I was still a student, I worked at several architecture firms, including OMA; I worked on the Prada store in New York. And then, before I graduated, I had already started United Nude with Galahad Clark, who comes from the Clark’s shoe company family. We were already in product development, and the brand was officially launched about a year after I graduated.
Who is your design hero? It’s between John DeLorean, from DeLorean Motors, and the Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer.
The Biospiracy bootie (left) and boot are the latest designs in an ongoing collaboration between United Nude and Iris Van Harpen.
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