An International Conference at the Building Centre, London,
3-5 March 2011
Please note that Amanda Levete and Enric Ruiz-Geli are no longer able to participate, replacement speakers have been sourced.
Confirmed Speakers and Chairs
Bart J de Boer
Since 1998, Bart de Boer has been working as researcher and project manager at the Energy research Centre of the Netherlands (ECN). With the background of a building engineer, he is an expert in the field of Energy in Buildings. He has an extensive research experience in the fields of Active Facades (Smartfacade, FACET), Passive house concept (PEP), Building Integrated Photovoltaics (PV Performance) and Energy Performance directive (EPG commission). He participates as researcher and project manager in many national and international R&D and knowledge dissemination projects, in close collaboration with industry, universities and other research institutes.
Sir Peter Cook
Sir Peter Cook FRIBA is an architect, teacher and writer. He was one of the founder members of Archigram and was co-editor of Archigram magazine. Adopting a high tech, light weight, infra-structural approach Archigram’s hypothetical projects utilised modular technology, mobility through the environment, space capsules and mass-consumer imagery.
He was Director of the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London from 1970-1972 and was appointed Life Professor at the Staedelschule (Art Academy) of Frankfurt in 1984, helping establish its reputation as one of the leading German Architecture schools. He later became Professor of Architecture at the Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL. In 2002 the Royal Institute of British Architects awarded Archigram the Royal Gold Medal for architecture. In 2004 Peter was shortlisted for the Stirling Prize with Colin Fournier for the Kunsthaus Graz and in 2007 he received a Knighthood for services to architecture in the Queen’s Birthday Honours.
He now runs CRAB Studio, co-founded with Gavin Robotham. Two CRAB buildings are under construction housing in Madrid: the Law faculty of the Vienna Economics University and the Vallecas social housing project. CRAB has a travelling exhibition touring Bournemouth-Kyoto-Tokyo -Madrid.
www.crabstudio.co.uk
www.archigram.net
http://archigram.westminster.ac.uk
Christian Friedrich
Christian Friedrich was born in Germany. After studies of Physics and Philosophy in Berlin and completion of an architectural engineering degree at Hanzehogeschool Groningen, he finished his graduate education (MSc) in architecture at Delft University of Technology, Netherlands. He co-founded media artist collective Ezthetics and in 2002 joined Hyperbody, first as student and eventually as researcher. Since 2002 he is regularly involved in projects of the architectural office of Kas Oosterhuis and Ilona Lenard, ONL. Christian is currently immersed in his PhD thesis research "Immediate Architecture - How to design, build and house near the speed of human desire".
Dr Jonathan Hale
Dr Jonathan Hale: Associate Professor & Reader in Architectural Theory at the Department of Architecture and Built Environment, University of Nottingham. Course Director for the Master of Architecture (Design) and the interdisciplinary MA in Architecture and Critical Theory. Research interests include: architectural theory and criticism; the philosophy of technology; the relationship between architecture and the body; museums and architectural exhibitions. Author of numerous articles and books and co-editor with Dr. William W. Braham (University of Pennsylvania) of Rethinking Technology: a Reader in Architectural Theory (Routledge, 2007). Founder member of the international subject group: Architectural Humanities Research Association (AHRA)
Alex Haw, atmos
Alex Haw is an architect and artist operating at the intersection of design, research, art and the urban environment. He runs atmos, a collaborative, exploratory, design-led practice creating architecture and events with an emphasis on content and connectivity, real-time responsiveness and technological innovation, spatial sensuality and heightened articulation. Projects range from private houses to public landscapes, installations to eco-cities; atmos is currently working on turning real-time body-scans into performative spaces, a digitally-fabricated house, an inhabitable cloud, a self-learning office and an eco-city for the Middle East. Alex studied at the Bartlett and Princeton on a Fulbright, worked for Grimshaws, Rogers and Diller+Scofidio, and has run design studios at the AA, Cambridge and TU Vienna. He writes & lectures widely, is contributing editor at WIRED UK and runs Latitudinal Cuisine.
Chuck Hoberman
Chuck Hoberman is the founder of Hoberman Associates, a multidisciplinary practice with clients ranging across sectors including consumer products, deployable shelters, and space structures. Examples of his commissioned work include the transforming LED screen that served as the primary stage element for the U2 360° world tour and the Hoberman Arch in Salt Lake City, installed as the centerpiece for the Winter Olympic Games (2002). Other noteworthy commissions include a retractable dome for the World’s Fair in Hanover, Germany (2000); the Expanding Hypar (1997) at the California Museum of Science and Industry; the Expanding Sphere (1992) at the Liberty Science Center, Jersey City, New Jersey; and the Expanding Geodesic Dome (1997) at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris.
Hoberman’s work has been exhibited several times at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. In 2008 his commissioned installation Emergent Surface was part of the exhibit “Design and the Elastic Mind.” In 2008, alongside Buro Happold Principal Craig Schwitter, Hoberman formed the Adaptive Building
Initiative. The joint venture united Hoberman’s design vision with Buro Happold’s 30 years of engineering excellence to develop retractable façades, responsive shading and ventilation, operable roofs, and canopies for the built environment.
Hoberman holds a bachelor’s degree in sculpture from Cooper Union and a master’s degree in mechanical engineering from Columbia University. He won the Chrysler Award for Innovation and Design in 1997.
Donald E. Ingber
Don is Founding Director of the Wyss Institute and a leader in the emerging field of biologically inspired engineering. He oversees a multifaceted effort to identify the mechanisms that living organisms use to self assemble and to apply these design principles to develop advanced materials and devices. Within this overall effort, he also leads the Biomimetic Microsystems platform in which microfabrication techniques from the computer industry are used to build functional circuits with living cells as components. His most recent innovation is a technology for building tiny, complex, three-dimensional models of human organs. These "organs on chips"
mimic complicated human functions, providing critical information for diagnostic and therapeutic applications more reliably and at a fraction of the cost and resources associated with traditional drug-testing methods. Don has made major contributions to cell and tissue engineering, angiogenesis and cancer research, systems biology, and nanobiotechnology. He was the first researcher to recognize that tensegrity architecture (in which a system stabilizes itself mechanically by balancing local compression with continuous tension) is a fundamental principle in the way living organisms are structured at the nanometer scale.
Don has authored more than 300 publications and 40 patents and has received numerous distinctions including the Pritzer Award from the Biomedical Engineering Society. He holds the Judah Folkman Professorship of Vascular Biology at Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston and is a Professor of Bioengineering at the Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. Ingber also serves on the Board of Directors of the National Space Biomedical Research Institute and was recently elected to the College of Fellows of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering.
http://www.childrenshospital.org/research/ingber/
Aneel Kilaire
Aneel Kilaire studied Mechanical Engineering (MEng) at the University of Nottingham (1999-2003) specialising in fluid mechanics. In 2004 he began work with Buro Happold Consulting Engineers as a building services engineer in their Bath office working on notable projects such as the Emirates Stadium, London and Landmark Tower, Abu Dhabi. After three years working at Buro Happold, Aneel returned to Nottingham to study for a PhD in Architecture on the subject of Integrated Facades co-sponsored by Buro Happold and the EPSRC. Aneel is currently in his fourth year of study.
Professor Ulrich Knaack
Ulrich Knaack has a been a full professor of Design at Delft University of Technology. In the Chair, he concentrates on the fundamentals of construction, the application of construction materials and elements, and the joints between the elements and materials themselves. The Chair analyses construction principles and the relationship with the production process, and examines unusual constructions and specific parts of buildings, such as outer walls. Important research topics are glass, outer wall constructions, prefabrication and the systematics and structuring of the field as a whole. This primarily involves research into the feasibility and application of new or innovative construction techniques and materials. Examples of materials that have recently been developed in this way are glass-fibre reinforced concrete and constructive glass.
Among the areas of Knaack’s research are economic double-skin outer walls, façades in which the installations of a building are integrated and outer wall systems which are suitable for free-formed, ICT-operated architecture. Another feature of the Chair is the far-reaching integration of research and education. This occurs as a result of supervision of the Bachelor’s and Master’s student projects, and by integrating teaching groups in different parts of the course. Students in these groups are given the chance to test the results of research in models, so that they can become familiar with the large-scale problems that arise upon completion, on the basis of a concrete application.
He has published extensively on the subject of the outer walls of buildings and constructive glass, and has worked at the RKW Architektur und Städtebau firm of architects in Düsseldorf, among others.
Odysseas Kontovourkis
Odysseas Kontovourkis, Ph.D., is currently Lecturer in the area of Architectural Communication Media in the Department of Architecture at the University of Cyprus. He received his Diploma in Architecture Engineering from the National Technical University of Athens, Greece. He conducted research studies in the Department of Architecture Engineering at the University of Osaka, Japan, and PhD studies in the Department of Architecture and Civil Engineering at the University of Bath, United Kingdom. His research and teaching interests focus on the integration of computational design and fabrication strategies with architectural design process aiming at the optimization of architectural design and construction according to functional, structural, environmental, and morphological architectural design criteria. Currently his research covers the fields of digital architectural design based on generative and parametric processes, digital fabrication strategies, and human movement behaviour simulation with emphasis on pedestrian modelling in the built environment.
Professor Robert Kronenburg
Robert Kronenburg PhD RIBA is an architect and holds the Roscoe Chair of Architecture at the Liverpool School of Architecture, University of Liverpool, United Kingdom. His research examines portable, ephemeral and flexible architecture. His books include Houses in Motion: The Genesis, History and Development of the Portable Building, Portable Architecture, Spirit of the Machine and he is an editor of the Transportable Environments book series. His most recent books are Flexible: Architecture that Responds to Change (2007) and Portable Architecture: Design and Technology (2008) which were translated into Spanish, French and German language editions. His book Live Architecture: Venues Stages and Festivals for Popular Music will be published by Taylor and Francis in 2011.
Professor Kronenburg is a past Fulbright fellow and in 1998 received a visiting fellowship at St. Johns College, Oxford University. His research has received support from the Building Centre Trust, London, the Graham Foundation, Chicago, the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council, the Daiwa Foundation and the Leverhulme Trust. He curated the major exhibition Portable Architecture (1998) held at the Royal Institute of British Architects, London, the touring exhibition Spontaneous Construction (1998-9) and he was curatorial advisor on the Vitra Design Museum’s exhibition Living in Motion (2002-06). He is a co-researcher on the AHRC funded interdisciplinary research projects City in Film: Liverpool’s Urban Landscape and the Moving Image (2006-8), and Mapping the City in Film (2008-10).
Maria Matheou
Maria Matheou is currently conducting her Ph.D research at the University of Cyprus. She is an adjunct faculty member in the area of architectural technology at the Department of Architecture at the University of Cyprus. She holds a B.Sc. in Architecture, 2009, and a Diploma of Architect – Engineer, 2010, both degrees from the University of Cyprus. Her Diploma thesis on kinetic and interactive architecture was awarded the Prize for Excellence in Architectural Design 2010. Her research interests are in structural and architectural design, kinetic architecture, automation systems, design methods and digital tools.
Will McLean
Will McLean is a principal lecturer and joint coordinator of technical studies teaching in the Department of Architecture at the University of Westminster. He has co-authored two books with Pete Silver, Fabrication; The Designers Guide, Architectural Press, Oxford 2004 and most recently An Introduction to Architectural Technology, Laurence King, London 2008. He is currently working on a new book with Peter Silver and structural engineer Peter Evans, entitled Structures in Action: Structural Engineering for Architects, to be published by Laurence King in 2012. He wrote a regular column for Architectural Design (AD) magazine entitled McLean’s Nuggets‚ between 2005 and 2010. In 2008 he established Bibliotheque McLean www.bibliothequemclean.com an independent publisher of art and architecture books. The first publication is Quik Build: Adam Kalkin’s ABC of Container Architecture, London 2008 and future publications include a new book by Professor John Frazer. As a designer McLean has worked the last decade on a series of public projects with artist father Bruce McLean, most notably the recently completed Dalry Primary School in North Ayrshire.
Marios C. Phocas
Marios C. Phocas received his Diploma degree in Architecture including in depth studies in building technology and structural design from the University of Stuttgart in 1995. He completed his doctorate on earthquake resistant structural building design, at the Institute of Structural Systems and Structural Building Design (ITKE) at the Faculty of Architecture and Urban Planning at the University of Stuttgart in 1999. Dr. Phocas is currently Associate Professor and Interim Head of the Department of Architecture at the University of Cyprus, since 2009 and 2006 respectively, as well as co-principal of the Archimedes Research Center for Structural and Construction Technology, since 2005. From 2004 until 2009 he served as Assistant Professor at the Program of Architecture. Prior to his appointment at the University of Cyprus he was Main Research Associate, Academic Teaching Consultant, and extraordinary Dozent at ITKE of the University of Stuttgart, from 1996 until 2004. He is the author and/or co-author of numerous publications in the areas of integrated architectural design, structural and construction design and earthquake resistant structural building design. He has received several architectural awards for project designs in collaboration, in Germany and Cyprus.
Alex de Rijke
Alex worked as an Architect in Amsterdam and London before establishing dRMM with Philip Marsh and Sadie Morgan in 1995. He has taught widely, including at the Royal College of Art, the Architectural Association, London Metropolitan University and was guest Professor at the Düsseldorf School of Architecture. He has lectured in Scandinavia, Europe and Asia as an expert in the relationship between design concepts and emerging construction types. He has presented conference papers on: architecture in relation to digital working methods; the role of architecture in large-scale consultation projects in the public sector; and prefabricated and mobile architecture.
At dRMM, Alex focuses on design. He was Project Director for the innovative Kingsdale School, Naked House and Sliding House projects. He combines leadership of an expanding practice with ongoing research into contemporary materials and sustainable methods of construction. dRMM’s work is well known for delivering an unusual and direct relation between lateral design concepts and the art of building non-standard architecture from standard components and constraints. Alex's current priority is developing dRMM's pioneering work and expertise in the application of cross-laminated timber design.
2007-2008 Design for London Advisory Group (part of team of urban design advisors to the Mayor)
2009-2010 The Peter Behrens Guest Professor, School of Architecture, Dusseldorf
2009 Southwark Council Design Review Panel
Dr Holger Schnädelbach
'Dr Holger Schnädelbach is a Senior Research Fellow in the Mixed Reality Lab (MRL), Computer Science, University of Nottingham. His PhD at the Bartlett School of Architecture was concerned with the spatial aspects of the relationship between physical and virtual environments, leading to the prototypical Mixed Reality Architecture. His work at the MRL has provided experience in designing, implementing and evaluating interactive systems. His work has resulted in publications in leading conferences and journals, such as ACM CHI, TOCHI, CSCW, Presence and Space Syntax Symposium. During a recent Leverhulme Fellowship he was given the space to concentrate on Adaptive Architecture, concerned with buildings that adapt to their environment, their inhabitants and objects in their vicinity. This work has developed a particular focus on what it means to inhabit adaptive buildings, considering the motivations, strategies and challenges that individuals, groups and organisations face when the buildings around them adapt.
Professor Michael Stacey
Michael Stacey is Chair in Architecture and Director of Architecture at the University of Nottingham, where he leads the Zero Carbon Architecture Research Studio [ZCARS]; which focuses on the design of zero carbon homes in Nottingham. He is also Research Professor at University of Waterloo, Ontario. His research is centred on extending the boundaries of the possible, whilst combining quality and affordability and thus informing the built environment. Themes within his research include: digital fabrication, form finding in components and architecture, offsite manufacture, façade design and procurement, emergent materials and sustainability. Current research programmes include is the study of zero carbon architecture, the development of technology for the built environment over the past 100 years, digital fabrication and architecture, a green guide for aluminium and a studio design guide for the use of concrete. He is the author of a wide range of publications including Component Design (2001), Digital Fabricators: Editor (2004), Concrete: A Studio Design Guide (2009) and Making Architecture, Editor with Dr Darren Deane (2010). He writes regularly on architecture and tectonics including a monthly series in Building Design Magazine. Michael Stacey in his professional life combines practice, research, writing and teaching. In 1987 he cofounded Brookes Stacey Randall Architects and in 2004 he re-established Michael Stacey Architects. Product design for the building industry includes the invention of the Aspect 2 integrated composite cladding system, which was manufactured and marketed by Corus. His design portfolio demonstrates a commitment to design excellence, which has been recognised by numerous national and international awards. Key projects include: East Corydon Station, Thames Water Tower, Wembley Gateway Urban Regeneration Masterplan, Enschede Integrated Transport Interchange, Art House Chelsea, Expertex Textile Centrum and Ballingdon Bridge.