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Items from the NAI Collection
The Collection Information System (CIS) provides access to the largest section of the NAI collection and the NAI website. There are also a number of external databases you can consult for journal articles, for example.
Searching the collection using the NAI/Bonas Collection Information System
One search screen puts two centuries of Dutch architecture at your fingertips. The CIS unlocks descriptions and images of people and organisations, awards and events, books and journals, drawings and objects, scale models and posters. CIS content is based on descriptions of pieces from the NAI collection and from the work lists of hundreds of Dutch architects, which have been compiled by Stichting Bonas (The Bonas Foundation is a research foundation supported by the NAI). In addition, all content from the NAI website is also included.
Please note: the CIS database is still under construction. If you can't find what you are looking for, please contact the reading room staff at +31 10 440 1270 or collection@nai.nl
Go to the Collection Information System
Searching for journal articles
The Collection Information System contains the most important Dutch journals of the twentieth century, but no current or international publications. To access those you can use two external web catalogues, ABSIS and API.
ABSIS (Architectuur, Bouwtechniek, Stedebouw Informatie Systeem - Architecture, Construction, and Urban Development Information System)
ABSIS is an online catalogue that has been compiled by Delft University of Technology. ABSIS contains journal articles from 1989 onwards, purely related to Dutch and Belgian architecture, work by Dutch and Belgian architects abroad and work by international architects in the Netherlands and Belgium.
Please note that this catalogue does not cover the NAI collection, but a similar one. You can use ABSIS to search in journals that the NAI also has in its collection.
Go to the ABSIS web catalogue
API (Architectural Publication Index)
The API is a product put together by RIBA (Royal Institute of British Architects) in London. This web catalogue contains journal articles and other publications from 1973 onwards and has an international focus.
Please note that this catalogue does not cover the NAI collection, but a similar one. You can use the API to search in journals that the NAI also has in its collection.
Go to the API web catalogue
Searching the OMA archive
The archive of the Office for Metropolitan Architecture (OMA) contains 44 projects from the earlier years up to 1999. Using the START database you can search for projects and request materials relating to them in the NAI reading room. START also provides additional information, such as biographical details, a bibliography and articles about a variety of subjects related to OMA's work.
Go to the OMA START database
Answers to frequently asked questions about searching the collection can be found here.
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Answers to frequently asked questions concerning the nature and contents of the collection can be found here.
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February 2009 | A first, very basic version of the new Collection
Information System (CIS) can now be consulted online. The development
of the CIS is an ambitious long-term project designed to make the
entire NAI collection accessible. While this first version of the CIS
does not yet use all the system’s options, it will enable you to search
a large part of the collection from your own computer. The inventories
of the archives are available as full text in the CIS.
> Read more...
Future architectural archives will consist of digital material. This digital heritage is much more vulnerable than paper and asks for specific techniques in the field of storage, preservation, description and presentation. In a three day conference, the NAI aims to map the development of research and experiences in creating, managing and using digital architectural archives.
> Read more...
The NAI’s poster collection comprises almost 1,500 posters from 1893 to
the present. They come from the archives of various architects,
architecture agencies and organisations, having been collected, and
some even designed, by the architects themselves.
> Read more...
