Cleveland鈥檚 nonprofit North Coast Waterfront Development Corporation has hired a new team of planners to create a fresh vision for the Downtown Cleveland lakefront.
Their mission includes revising an earlier lakefront plan to capitalize on opportunities made possible by the planned departure of the NFL Browns from the city鈥檚 lakefront stadium to a new covered stadium in suburban Brook Park in 2029.
The new planning effort will be led by the firm of MVRDV, based in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. MVRDV has worked on major waterfront plans carried out in cities across the world, including Oslo, Rotterdam, Amsterdam, Shanghai and San Francisco.
The firm鈥檚 work created conditions for new development in those cities, and in some cases, the firm also contributed designs for eye-catching buildings that resemble stacked shipping containers, rocky cliffs or a giant airplane hangar.
鈥淲e hired MVRDV because they鈥檙e successful here and in Europe and Asia, with a lot of experience in developing waterfronts and in designing iconic structures,鈥欌�� Scott Skinner, director of the waterfront development corporation, said in an interview.
The corporation, which shared the news exclusively with 精东影业, signed a contract with MVRDV Thursday. Skinner declined to say how much MVRDV will be paid. As a nonprofit, the corporation is not required to disclose the information, he said. But he said the firm would be paid out of the $3 million in seed money provided by Cleveland after it established the organization in late 2023.
MVRDV will work alongside local consultants from the Cleveland office of the global architecture firm DLR Group and a yet-to-be named local organization that will facilitate community engagement. The Dutch firm will also collaborate with the city鈥檚 planning department and with Brecksville-based DiGeronimo Development, hired in December by the waterfront corporation as the master developer for the site.
鈥淚'm super excited鈥欌�� about planning the lakefront, said Rutger Huiberts, director of MVRDV鈥檚 New York office, during a recent visit to Cleveland. 鈥淐ollaboration is the key here. We don't want to design something (that looks like it is) from outer space and land it on the waterfront. It needs to come from here and it needs to come as a result of dialogues that we have with people.鈥欌��
Kevin DiGeronimo, his firm鈥檚 development principal, said in an email, 鈥淲e鈥檙e excited to be working with MVRDV as part of this next phase of lakefront planning. Their global experience with complex urban projects brings a fresh perspective to Cleveland, and we believe their combination of creativity and practicality will be valuable as ideas begin to take shape. This phase is an important step in building a framework that reflects the opportunities of the site and helps guide its long-term evolution.鈥�
Tom McNair, the city鈥檚 chief of integrated development, said in an email: 鈥淭he City is thrilled to be partnering with DiGeronimo Companies and the North Coast Waterfront Development Corporation in working with a firm as talented as MVRDV to build off of the great work begun by Field Operations.
鈥淭he departure of Browns Stadium will allow this work to evolve to fully take advantage of one of the most unique geographies in the world. Rooted in public input, with a tremendous foundation, we look forward to the possibilities and making them a reality.鈥�
MVRDV was chosen from 15 applicants worldwide by the development corporation, city officials and DiGeronimo, Skinner said. The dozen members of the development corporation鈥檚 board include Cleveland Mayor Justin Bibb and City Council President Councilman Blaine Griffin, who represents Ward 6.
Browns move triggered need for new plan
Hiring a new lakefront planning team may strike some as odd, given that the city of Cleveland completed a much-publicized plan in 2024 after several years of work and extensive public outreach and feedback.
The city , carried out by the New York-based landscape architecture firm of Field Operations. The firm based its work on a lakefront design concept developed in 2021 for $1 million by Jimmy and Dee Haslam, co-owners of the Browns.
The city followed up on the Haslam concept vigorously, and Field Operations completed its plan in 2024. But when the Haslams decided to a year later to move the Browns to Brook Park, the Field Operations plan instantly became out of date because it was grounded on the assumption that the stadium and the Browns would remain at North Coast Harbor as a major anchor alongside the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and the Great Lakes Science Center.
The Browns鈥� decision to decamp for Brook Park and to help pay for demolishing the stadium with a $100 million settlement changed everything, including the amount of land available for redevelopment.
When the stadium is gone,鈥痶he redevelopment site will grow from 37.5 acres to nearly 60 acres, and there are no plans yet for the 22 acres now occupied by the stadium.
Skinner, who became director of the development corporation in March 2024, said it makes sense to hire a new planning firm to question earlier ideas and explore possibilities that didn鈥檛 exist when the Browns were planning on staying.
For example, Field Operations envisioned clustering high- and mid-rise apartments and hotels plus retail and public spaces on the north side of the stadium, on former port docks close to the lake that are now used primarily for parking.
If the city simply went ahead with that plan, the tall buildings would block views of the lake from the land now occupied by the stadium, an idea that makes no sense. When the stadium is gone, new configurations on the entire site will be possible, Skinner said.
Collaborative effort
MVRDV鈥檚 designers said they鈥檙e not coming to town to assert their own views of what鈥檚 needed.
鈥淲e're not going to design this piece of the city by ourselves,鈥欌�� Huiberts said. 鈥淚t's really a co-creation exercise. We鈥檒l be helped by amazing people around us.鈥�
Skinner added that the research and public meetings that guided the previous work by Field Operations will inform the new work by MVRDV.
The earlier input included more than 5,000 responses to community surveys and several hundred meetings held over three years. The new plan will emphasize values that emerged in those studies, including the importance of making the lakefront affordable and accessible to the broadest possible public, Skinner said.
MVRDV and the waterfront corporation plan on holding additional public meetings, although nothing is scheduled yet. Skinner said a new vision should be ready for feedback and revisions by late summer or early fall.
Anna Gasco, head of MVRDV鈥檚 17-member urban planning division in Rotterdam, will co-lead the project with Huiberts. Their work will be overseen by Nathalie de Vries, one of MVRDV鈥檚 three co-founding principals.
Integrating with new infrastructure
MVRDV will devise a street grid, design guidelines, potential building sites and potential uses for the buildings and public spaces. In addition to coordinating with the city and DiGeronimo Co., they will make sure their plans dovetail with those of a design-builder to be hired by the city to carry out two important pieces of infrastructure designed to trigger new development.
One is a lakefront connector bridge and garage, which will extend from the north end of the downtown Mall across railroad lines and the Ohio 2 Shoreway to make a stronger connection between downtown and the lakefront. The other is a revamp of the Shoreway, intended to turn it into a 35-mph boulevard, rather than the highway-style regional route it is today.
Both projects will be funded by $20 million from the state of Ohio and $130 million in federal and state grants awarded under former President Joe Biden and still approved by President Donald Trump.
The urban design guidelines created by MVRDV will establish a spatial armature for future development by identifying view corridors of the lake and the skyline that need to be preserved, plus building-height and setback requirements that determine how close buildings may stand next to streets, sidewalks and public spaces, and how high they may rise.
Such guidelines helped make the Gateway sports complex built between 1994 and 1997 on the south side of downtown a widely acclaimed success.
MVRDV will also explore which types of buildings should go where, in conjunction with DiGeronimo and its analysis of demand for particular uses, whether housing, hotels, office and retail.
MVRDV history
Founded in 1993, MVRDV is known for producing iconic buildings of a type that Cleveland has welcomed in the past, including I.M. Pei鈥檚 Rock Hall. The firm鈥檚 planning work in Cleveland will not include architecture for any specific buildings. Such buildings might emerge in deals and partnerships created by DiGeronimo and the waterfront development authority. Huiberts said the firm would hope to capture such an assignment, but that鈥檚 not its goal now.
The project also will not involve any planning for the land occupied by Burke Lakefront Airport, which the city is thinking about closing. Skinner said that while the airport remains open, it will have no significant effect on building heights on much of the downtown lakefront site, which he said is outside the flight path.
The lakefront assignment is not MVRDV鈥檚 first in Cleveland. In 2007-08, Winy Maas, also one of the firm鈥檚 founding principals, designed an on Euclid Avenue at East 116th Street.
The design called for an exposed steel structure that hunched in the middle like a giant inchworm to shelter the school鈥檚 new main entrance.
Clashing estimates raised questions about whether the school could afford the $55 million cost during the 2008 recession. The art institute opted for a new design by the Philadelphia firm of Stantec. The final project, completed in 2015, was financed through a $75 million capital campaign.
MVRDV鈥檚 new assignment on Cleveland鈥檚 lakefront gives it an even more prominent opportunity to shape the city鈥檚 future. But its designers said their goal is to build on what exists, not create something entirely new or alien.
鈥淚 don't know if we need to change the image of Cleveland,鈥欌�� Gasco said. 鈥淲e definitely don't have pretensions of doing that. We first have to understand what Cleveland is and how can this new piece of city add to it.鈥�
Whatever it designs, MVRDV will consider the lakefront as central to its thinking.
鈥淚t's ultimately the place where Downtown Cleveland touches the lakefront,鈥欌�� Huiberts said. 鈥淭he entire district itself needs to breathe waterfront. It needs to somehow be permeated with it.鈥�
