Professor Winy Maas is an architect, urban planner, landscape architect and one of the three founding partners of globally operating architecture firm MVRDV. We strongly suggest to check out the gallery of their exhilarating projects on their site. Maas lectures and teaches excessively around the world in both academic and professional settings and is also a professor at the Technical University of Delft where he runs The Why Factory: a post-graduate research institute for the future city. He is also the official urban planner of Almere in the Netherlands.

Maas points out urbanism is not dead - unlike some critics have earlier maintained - and that there is power and will to make cities better. His company, MVRDV, does not only design buildings but also make urban plans and strategies for bigger companies. He says that dreams are needed to paint the future. In this episode Maas tells us about the importance of research in the work of MVRDV. How do data and creativity interplay? And can urbanism offer help in solving problems such as social injustice and inequality?