Blog

Congratulations to Prof Kester Rattenbury on receiving the 2022 RIBA Annie Spink Award

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

On Monday, December 6, Professor Kester Rattenbury received the biannual 2022 RIBA Annie Spink Award at the RIBA President’s Medals Awards ceremony.

“The prestigious biennial prize is awarded to an individual who has made a significant contribution to the advancement of architectural education, in a school of architecture anywhere in the world that offers courses validated by the RIBA. 

Rattenbury is an architectural teacher, critic, writer and academic, who has taught design studio for 30 years: first at the University of Greenwich; then since 2000 at the University of Westminster in London. Here she ran the experimental studio DS15 with Sean Griffiths and also devised and spearheaded the research group EXP (Experimental Practice) with its leading projects the Supercrit series and the Archigram Archival Project – which was rated ‘Outstanding’ by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. She was made FRIBA in 2005 and Professor at Westminster in 2014. ”

RIBA

Read more here.

Featured image: Kester Rattenbury by Clare Banstead (source: RIBA website)

Norman Foster Foundation: 2023 NFF Energy Workshop, supported by the GS Energy Corporation | Deadline for applications: Sunday, December 18 by 24:00 (CEST)

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

The 2023 Energy Workshop will take place in Madrid, Spain, from 20-24 February 2023 and will gather a team of ten granted scholars drawn from diverse backgrounds to explore new opportunities that combine natural processes with emerging technologies.

Each grant will cover all transportation, accommodation and incurred costs related to the Workshop in Madrid. Students will be invited to engage with Norman Foster and an interdisciplinary Academic Body composed by researchers, industry practitioners and academicians.

For more information please find attached the Open Call Form: 

NFF-2023-EEnergy-Workshop-Open-Call-ApplicationDownload

MArch DS18 student, Georgios Malliaropoulos, reports on his experience from 2022 Sustainability Workshop by the Norman Foster Foundation

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

The 2022 Sustainability Workshop organised by Norman Foster Foundation took place in Madrid, Spain, between 10th and 14th of October.

Georgios spoke about his experience to University of Westminster’s News:

“The Workshop aimed to explore the concept of sustainability at the intersection of natural and artificial. During the week-long programme, we aimed to generate projects and prototypes that demonstrated the transformative potential of combining different types of intelligence, namely ecological, human, and technological.”

To read more, please go here.  

Technical Studies Lecture Series: Michael Jones, Foster and Partners “Building Bloomberg” | Thursday, December 8 at 18:00 (GMT), M416 + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Thursday, 8th of December, 6pm (GMT)

Where: M416, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS + Online (see tumblr page below for link)

Michael Jones is a deputy head of studio at Foster + Partners. Alongside Senior Executive Partner Stefan Behling, he oversees almost 100 architects working on a wide range of international projects. He was awarded a bachelor degree in architecture in 1986 and joined the practice in the same year as an architectural assistant.  In 1988, he continued his studies at the Royal College of Art, gaining his master’s degree in architecture in 1990. He subsequently returned to Foster + Partners, where he qualified as an architect in 1994. 

He initially worked on a number of education buildings, starting with the Deuxième Lycée de Fréjus in the South of France, followed by the Law Faculty for the University of Cambridge. Thereafter, he focused on working with historic and listed buildings, initially as the project architect of the new International Rail Terminal for London at St Pancras Station, then as project director on the detail design and procurement for the Great Court at the British Museum. In 2000, he began work on the large-scale masterplan and expansion of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. During this time, he was leading the design of the UK Supreme Court in Westminster, the new Winspear Opera House in Dallas and a major a new Faculty Building for Imperial College London. 

Most recently he has been responsible for the new European headquarters for Bloomberg in the City of London and the ongoing renovation and expansion of the Imperial War Museum in London, the first phase of which was completed to coincide with the centenary of the First World War in 2014. 

https://technicalstudies.tumblr.com/

For details contact: Will McLean – w.f.mclean@wmin.ac.uk 

Technical Studies Lecture Series: Gnanli Landrou, ETH / OXARA “Cleancrete” | Thursday, December 1 at 18:00 (GMT), M416 + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Thursday, 2nd of December, 6pm (GMT)

Where: M416, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS + Online (see tumblr page below for link)

“A derivative of the Northern Togolese language, Lamb-Kabyè, Oxara means, ‘Gathering and Community’, bringing the actors of the construction ecosystem together to collectively create an innovative and sustainable industry is a key ingredient to make our business scalable and to achieve our vision of providing safe and decent housing to all.” 

Gnanli Landrou

Gnanli Landrou is a materials scientist and entrepreneur. He was born in Togo, and when he was a young boy he travelled with his uncle in West Africa watching him build earth houses. Later, whilst studying in France he researched the challenges facing the global construction industry – energy and CO2 ​intensive production of cement, dwindling supplies of construction grade sand and gravel, and the high cost of concrete, unaffordable in many countries. Gnanli had experienced the benefits of building with clay/earth but also understood how labour-intensive and time-consuming traditional clay brick construction was. As a doctoral student at ETH Zurich, Gnanli worked with mentor Professor Guillaume Habert and together, they developed a process to turn clay-​based excavation material into an alternative cement free concrete. Importantly this material can be poured as concrete using the ready-mix infrastructure of the concrete industry. 

His ETH spin-​off company Oxara, is now developing a cement-​free concrete made from clay-​based excavation material with his main goal to solve the lack of affordable housing in Africa. In 2019 Forbes magazine listed Gnanli as one of Europe’s 30 most influential entrepreneurs under the age of 30. 

This talk is co-hosted and kindly supported by the Engineering Club http://engineeringclub.org.uk/ 

https://technicalstudies.tumblr.com/

For details contact: Will McLean – w.f.mclean@wmin.ac.uk 

Architecture + Cities Research Seminar: Andrew Smith “Beyond the Pale” | Monday, November 28 at 1pm (GMT), M416

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Monday, 28th of November, 13:00-14:00 (GMT)

Where: M416, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS

The next Architecture + Cities Research Seminar will be on Monday 28 November, by Andrew Smith, Professor of Urban Experiences and Director of the Sustainable Cities and the Urban Environment Research Community (SCUE). Andrew’s presentation, ‘Beyond the Pale’ will critically analyse temporary fencing in public parks for ticketed festivals. 

Note that this will be an in-person only seminar.  

Technical Studies Lecture Series: Jan Balbaligo + Samsul Aripin, Zewa Architects “The Future of Building with Bamboo” | Tuesday, November 22 at 18:00 (GMT), M416 + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Tuesday, 22nd of November, 6pm (GMT)

Where: M416, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS + Online (see tumblr page below for link)

“bamboo … the green steel of the 21st Century” 

Vo Trong Nghia 

Bamboo is not a new building material, but given changing environmental design imperatives, this aggressive fast-growing plant species provides a strong and durable construction material. Bamboo is the largest member of the grass family and is one of the fastest growing plants on the planet – Moso bamboo from China can grow up 900 mm a day. Bamboo can be ready for harvest and construction use in three to five years compared with 20-25, for softwood timber. 

Jan will discuss new developments in the field of bamboo processing and engineering and the Future of building with this fast-growing ‘regenerative’ construction material. The talk will also feature a contribution from bamboo architect Samsul Aripin. In January 2020, designer and Bamboo builder Jan Balbaligo working with non-profit arts and social enterprise Cosmic Convergence completed the Eco-Salon in San Pablo La Laguna, Solalá, Guatemala. The Eco-Salon is a multi-functional indoor space built on top of an existing public school to provide space for music, sports, arts, dance and other activities to complement and enrich the formal education. The building structure is a bamboo framework, with a bamboo lathe (bamboo splits) roof and bamboo split walls with a Bajareke (clay and sand) infill. Jan Balbaligo is a great advocate for the use of bamboo in construction and she has worked on a number of temporary festival structures and small school and community buildings.  

https://technicalstudies.tumblr.com/

For details contact: Will McLean – w.f.mclean@wmin.ac.uk 

Association for Tourism in Higher Education Seminar: “Resilience, Recovery, and Rejuvenation” | Friday, November 25, 10:45 – 15:00 (GMT), Marylebone Campus, M416 (morning session) + MG28 (afternoon session)

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Friday, 25th of November at 10:45am

Where: M416 + MG28, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS

The Association for Tourism in Higher Education’s (ATHE) seminar Resilience, Recovery, and Rejuvenation will take place on Friday, 25th of November from 10.45am to 3pm. The morning session will be held in M416, and the afternoon session in MG28.

This timely event is being organised by Ilaria Pappalepodore.

You can book a place using this link: www.athe.org.uk/booking/

All welcome!

Call for Participants: “Thinkers for Architecture – DIALOGUE 1: Foucault / Merleau – Ponty / Latour | Application deadline: Friday, January 6, 2023

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

Research Workshop Convened by:

  • Gordana Fontana-Giusti (University of Kent)
  • Jonathan Hale (University of Nottingham)
  • Albena Yaneva (University of Manchester)

When: Monday, 24th of April —Thursday, 27th of April 2023

Where: Manchester, UK

The thought of Michel Foucault, Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Bruno Latour has greatly contributed to the advance of research scholarship in the field of architecture. As part of a hugely influential strand of French intellectual history that spans Structuralism, Post-structuralism, Phenomenology and contemporary Actor-Network Theory, the links between these three thinkers are many and vital, and yet in detail remain largely unexplored. Their work has rarely been discussed together, ‘in dialogue’, or across empirical examples and case studies drawn from architectural and urban research. This workshop provides an opportunity for such a dialogue, convened by the authors of three volumes in the Thinkers for Architects book series published by Routledge/Taylor&Francis: Foucault for Architects (Gordana Fontana-Giusti); Merleau-Ponty for Architects (Jonathan Hale); and Latour for Architects (Albena Yaneva). It offers a unique opportunity for young researchers to ‘think with’ these leading theorists of the last 100 years and to harvest applied knowledge for their ongoing research projects.

For more information, please visit here.

Technical Studies Lecture Series: Nikolay Shahpazov, Bennetts Associates “Regenerative Architecture” | Thursday, November 17 at 18:00 (GMT), M416 + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Thursday, 17th of November, 6pm (GMT)

Where: M416, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS + Online (see tumblr page below for link)

“Earth blocks have one tenth of the embodied carbon of other commonly specified materials such as blockwork, which is a cement-based product. Aside from the high energy demand during production, blockwork and concrete manufacturing consumes large quantities of sand, which has led to fast depleting sand supplies and environmentally damaging sea extraction. The low embodied carbon of earth blocks is a great starting point that positions us ahead of what most commercial developments are committing to right now.” 

Nikolay Shahpazov 

Since joining Bennetts Associates in 2019, Nikolay has been involved in various areas of research, with a particular focus on regenerative materials, setting up contacts with suppliers and manufacturers. Nikolay is a member of the Bennetts Associates Sustainability group. He studied architecture at the Architectural Association in London, graduating in 2007 and winning the Alex Stanhope Forbes Prize. 

As part of the new Tribeca development behind Kings Cross, Nikolay is helping to pioneer a new regenerative building process that will see the excavated subsoil of the site transformed into unfired earth blocks for use in the project. This initiative will reduce landfill waste and harness the benefits of this natural building material – regulating indoor temperature and humidity levels, and purifying the air by trapping and metabolising airborne pollutants.  

https://technicalstudies.tumblr.com/

For details contact: Will McLean – w.f.mclean@wmin.ac.uk