'Heartfelt, thought-provoking and hilariously funny'
– The New York Times
Koolhaas Houselife can be streamed from Friday 4 July until Thursday 7 August 2025 for €5.00, only on the AFFR Vimeo channel. If you don’t want to miss any updates about our online film programme, subscribe to our newsletter or keep an eye on our site and socials.
Koolhaas Houselife, Ila Bêka & Louise Lemoine, 2008, ’58
Koolhaas Houselife, directed by Ila Bêka and Louise Lemoine, offers a refreshingly intimate and tactile portrait of the celebrated House in Bordeaux, a 1998 design by Rem Koolhaas / OMA, through the perspective of someone who knows the house better than anyone: the housekeeper.
This witty and insightful landmark of architecture filmmaking invites the viewers to experience the building through the rhythms of daily life. Over 24 episodic chapters, we follow Guadalupe Acedo as she dusts, mops, vacuums, waters and reflects on the house’s eccentricities. As she wrestles with automated features gone awry, the film reveals the tension between the architect’s vision and the demands of everyday life.
NB: this film was created when the digitisation process was less advanced than it is now; the image quality may therefore be less high in comparison to contemporary online films.
About ‘The Five Films That Moved You’
AFFR celebrates its 25th anniversary! To mark the occasion, we’re showcasing ‘The Five Films That Moved You’ and will be screening an online public favourite each first Friday of the month – carefully selected from the 1,000+ films screened at the festival since its inception. Our online film programme offers a retrospective on the festival’s rich history while also highlighting AFFR PLAYTIME – the online AFFR cinema launched in 2017. This platform allows us to make more architecture films accessible to a wider audience for an extended period.
AFFR 25 Years!
The first initiative for AFFR – then the Architecture Film Festival Rotterdam – began in 2000. That’s why, this year, we’re celebrating our 25th anniversary in grant style. We’re not just looking back but also looking ahead, with retrospectives, debates, classics, immersive media, current issues, and a revamped website.
