BRIEF HISTORY OF THE OFFICE FOR METROPOLITAN ARCHITECTURE (GRANNY) Rem Koolhaas was born in Rotterdam in 1944. Already during his studies in architecture at Architectural Association School in London from 1968 to 1972, his interest was in metropolitan architecture. From this period also dates the many years of collaboration with Madelon Vriesendorp, Elia Zenghelis and Zoe Zenghelis, with whom he founded the architectural firm Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) in London in 1975. OMA's stated ambition was to transform analyses of contemporary society into contemporary architecture. The firm garnered much appreciation in the Netherlands with its design for the extension of the parliament building in The Hague (1978) . That same year, Rem Koolhaas' now classic text on modern architecture and society appeared Delirious New York: A Retroactive Manifesto for Manhattan. The commissions that followed prompted the establishment of the firm in Rotterdam in 1981. Initially, these were projects in the field of architecture and urban planning within the Netherlands. The first realized projects were the urban design for the IJ Square in Amsterdam North (1986) and the Nederlands Danstheater in The Hague (1987). In the late 1980s and early 1990s, the firm participated in a number of prestigious competitions abroad: the Bibliothèque de France (1989) and Deux Bibliothèques Jussieu (1993), both in Paris, and the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie (1989) in Karlsruhe. These projects were highly innovative in design and aroused much interest. They were ultimately not implemented. The urban development plan Euralille and the design for a congress center, both in Lille (1994), did come to fruition. In 1995 Koolhaas published S,M,L,XL with graphic designer Bruce Mau. This book once again addresses the relationship between society, architecture and urbanism and looks back on twelve years of OMA.