Bas Smets’ realised projects include the park of Thurn & Taxis and the Saint-Gilles Plaza in Brussels; the public space around the Trinity Tower in Paris La Défense, the Sunken Garden and the Mandrake Hotel in London, the Himara Waterfront in Albania and the Parc des Ateliers in Arles.
A number of his large projects are under construction, such a as the urban forest around the Part Dieu station in Lyon, the Nieuw Zuid project in Antwerp and the sculpture park in Amagansett, New York.
Each of these projects is part of an encompassing research into the possible roles of landscape projects. The aim is to invent ‘Augmented Landscapes’ by using the logics of nature. These augmented landscapes produce a new climate while creating new atmospheres. The collaboration with artists and scientists takes a central role in this research.
Bas Smets had a master in Architecture and Civil Engineering from the University of Leuven and a master in Landscape form the University of Geneva. He has taught in many schools such as the Ecole d’Architecture la Cambre in Brussels, the Ecole Spéciale d’Architecture in Paris and the Technische Universität in Graz.
In 2008 he was awarded the biennial French prize for young landscape architects ‘Les Nouveaux Albums des Jeunes Architectes et des Paysagistes’. A first monographic exhibition was produced in 2013 by deSingel International Arts Centre and arc en rêve centre for architecture in Bordeaux.
In 2017 he was appointed General Commissioner for the Biennial of Architecture of Bordeaux, and in 2018 he received the Award for Urbanism from the French Academy of Architecture.