ROTTERDAM.- Sofie De Caigny will become head of collections at Nieuwe Instituut on 1 February 2025. In this role, she is responsible for leading and managing the Collection Department and its acquisitions, innovative research and archiving initiatives, and plans to make the collection more accessible, visible, and linkable to contemporary issues and practices. She will also oversee the 1933 Sonneveld House, a leading example of Dutch functionalist architecture, and play a leading role in advancing Nieuwe Instituut’s positioning within local, national, and international heritage and heritage policy networks.

Sofie De Caigny is looking forward with great enthusiasm to taking care of the collection and the Sonneveld House. She sees a lot of opportunities and challenges for the special collection, which is also highly appreciated internationally. Together with the team at Nieuwe Instituut, she wants to work on the further safeguarding of the collection, both digital and analogue. In addition, there are opportunities to make the collection more widely known to the general public and to activate it within the design community.

Aric Chen, general and artistic director, Nieuwe Instituut: “We are thrilled that Sofie will be joining the Nieuwe Instituut team. With her deep background in architectural archives and institutions, combined with a generous, open attitude and outward-facing commitment to the field and its broader relevance, we look forward to her significant role in taking the collection, and the institute, into its next chapter."

Aukje Bolle, Managing Director, Nieuwe Instituut: “We are delighted with Sofie's arrival With her knowledge and experience, she will make a major positive contribution to the preservation and accessibility of the national collection.”

In recent years, Sofie De Caigny has worked as a visiting professor of Architectural Criticism, Architectural Actualia and Art History at the University of Antwerp; visiting professor of Cultural Studies at the University of Hasselt; director of the Flanders Architecture Institute; Secretary-General of the International Confederation of Architectural Museums. In addition to her role at Nieuwe Instituut, Sofie De Caigny is chair of the Committee for Environmental Quality and Cultural Heritage of the City of Rotterdam and a member of the Architecture Committee – Creative Industries Fund NL.

Counting 4 million items, the National Collection for Dutch Architecture and Urban Planning is one of the largest architecture collections in the world. It includes models and drawings to photographs and digital files and includes some 700 archives, ranging from those of H.P. Berlage, J.J.P Oud and Theo van Doesburg to Herman Hertzberger, Rem Koolhaas and MVRDV. Disclosing Architecture - an innovative six-year conservation, digitization, and interface program - is coming to a close, while squat archives and feminist activist architecture have expanded the parameters of the collection, alongside the development of archival tools for embedding multiplicity of interpretations and narratives.