Office Approach

We are an urban design and research practice. We focus on public space design, community-led projects and documentary based urban research.

We believe that good design of the public realm is essential for healthy urban environments and citizens. Public spaces are our common grounds, they are the spaces we share as such they need to be created in an open and collaborative process. Within this we strive to make great, playful spaces where people can meet to; play, hang out, exercise, learn, have fun and connect with each other.

Our working process follows four-steps

Observe - Research - Engage - Design

We observe the characteristics of a place, it’s patterns of use, the rhythm of its daily life. We use both photography and film alongside traditional fieldwork techniques of mapping and drawing. Filmmaking is integral to the way we capture, understand and visually communicate how cities and places work.

We research to understand the latest challenges cities, urban areas and their communities are facing. Part of the research work is carried out the courses TU Eindhoven and Academy of Architecture in Amsterdam

We engage and listen to the local communities in the places where we work. Urban research and public engagement go hand in hand to develop context aware solutions to the latest challenges for urban areas and their communities.

We design based on a clear brief defined with our clients and communities. Our focus is on creating high quality people-centred public spaces. Over the past years we have realised a number of playscapes in the Netherlands where play is integrated into every aspect of the design.

Credits

The projects at Studio dmau came about with help from:

Emanuela Schirone, Milja Hartikainen, Giovanni Lavanna, João Pedro Faria, Augusto Rodrigues, Reem Saouma, Elena Grimbacher, Alexander Petrounie, Thijs Baselmans, Hannah van der Sluijs

Studio dmau was founded in 2012 by Daryl Mulvihill an architect with an MA in documentary film. Daryl has extensive experience in urban design and strategy projects and with his documentary experience he brings a multidisciplinary approach to public space design, urban research and community engagement.

Daryl is a university lecturer at the chair of Urbanism and Urban Architecture at the TU Eindhoven where he co-ordinates; Theory and Practise of the Public Domain, a Masters Studio in High-Density Urban Housing and the Bachelor introduction to Urbanism. Next to this he lectures and co-ordinates the History of Urbanism module at the Amsterdam Academy of Architecture. He has previously been a tutor at TU Delft and the Rotterdam Academy of Architecture.

Lecturing

2017 - Ongoing - History of Urbanism, Academy of Architecture, Amsterdam

2019 - Ongoing - Theory and Practice of the Public Realm, TU Eindhoven

2020 - Ongoing - Urbanism and Architecture in Context, TU Eindhoven

Sept 2025 - Untitled, Academy of Architecture, Groningen

May 2025 - Dat is niet eerlijk! Pakhuis de Zwijger, Amsterdam

Nov 2024 - Co-creation and Participatory Documentary AFFR, Architecture Film Festival Rotterdam.

April 2019 - Common Grounds, CCAE, Cork, Ireland