Building a career: labour practices and cluster reproduction in Dutch architectural design

This paper explores how firms and workers deal with the specific characteristics of the labour market in a cutting-edge cultural industry, namely, Dutch architectural design. Based on in-depth interviews with principals, workers, and key informants, the relationship between a logic of economic practice with a logic of artistic practice is investigated. The intertwining of these two practices appears to be a crucial link in the generation of spin-offs in the long run. In this way, the unintended consequences of the motivations and actions on a micro-level foster, on a higher level, the reproduction of the cluster itself.