Open Studio is an interactive project run by the School of Architecture + Cities at the University of Westminster to make its design, research and practice-based work available online while it is happening. The site acts as a real time teaching and learning environment in which the work of both students and staff is curated and documented – the work of its design studios, or its other teaching and research groups and workshops. Read more in Blog, follow us on Twitter and like us on Instagram.
WHEN: Thursday, 3rd of April 2025 at 6pm
WHERE: M416 (Robin Evans Room), Marylebone Campus, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS
“Until it is built, all architecture is speculative fiction. As we contemplate the built worlds we will bring into being through our design work, this talk invites us to use methods of collective writing and making to learn from the speculative fiction authors who imagine alongside us.”
WHEN: Thursday, 27th of March 2025 at 6pm
WHERE: M416 (Robin Evans Room), Marylebone Campus, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS
Based on research conducted for her book, No Compromise: the work of Florence Knoll (Princeton Architectural Press, 2021), this presentation will look at the work of this iconic American designer. Florence Knoll was one of the minds behind the iconic Knoll enterprise: a company which became well-known for the licensing and distribution of some of the most seminal furniture pieces of the twentieth century – including the Barcelona collection, by Mies van der Rohe; the Tulip Collection, by Eero Saarinen; and the Diamond Collection, by Harry Bertoia.
“My research looks at the role Knoll had in commissioning and overviewing the production of these pieces (alongside many other classics issued by the company during her tenure), while also looking at her other activities in the company: her contribution to the development of the company’s unique marketing profile, the creation of a highly innovative textile department, and, most importantly, the establishment of the Knoll Planning Unit, the interior design division that she ran, and through which she invented the infamous ‘Knoll look’.”
Dr Ana Araujo was trained as an architect and currently works in the fields of art curating, research and education. Her interests range across the fields of design, the visual arts, psychology, anthropology and gender studies. Ana also runs an online art gallery which is focused on the investigation of the feminine in art and culture. She is currently course director of the MA Interior Architecture and Design course at Birmingham City University.
When: Monday, 17th of March 2025 at 6pm
Where: M416 (Robin Evans Room), Marylebone Campus, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS
In this lecture Professor Harry Charrington advocates for a more engaged history of architecture and place-making. He discusses some remarkable work in Helsinki and Kumasi, and introduces individuals with their own distinctive agency, showing that how they did things became what they achieved. He argues we need to share more stories like these if we are to develop a praxis capable of addressing the complexity of the living world. This is largely a task of recovery; these stories already exist as tacit knowledge in our day-to-day practices. Reflecting on over thirty years of practice, teaching, and research, and utilising archival material and oral histories, Charrington suggests how we might restore them to history – i.e. to humanity.
The event will be followed by a drinks reception – to close at 20:30.
When: From 7th of July to 20th of July 2025
Where: Hanoi, Vietnam
AAVS Hanoi is a two-week research programme that explores the concept of experimental preservation within the unique and rapidly evolving built environment of Hanoi, Vietnam. In response to the relentless pace of urban regeneration and localised informal (de)construction practices that continually reshape the city’s fabric, the programme seeks to address these dynamic changes by focusing on the digital documentation of overlooked 20th-century architectural artifacts, particularly those at risk of being forgotten or erased. By tapping into Hanoi’s distinctive context, the programme also delves into the material culture and urban narratives surrounding these architectural relics.
Using digital tools and advanced research methods, participants will capture, analyse and preserve these architectural elements, highlighting their historical, cultural and sociopolitical significance. The programme critically examines how these artifacts have contributed to Hanoi’s organic development, revealing the underlying forces shaping the city’s informal forms of living, working and playing. By connecting the past and present through experimental preservation, the programme aims to foster a deeper understanding of how urban spaces evolve in response to both external pressures and community-driven forces. From these findings, we aim to establish a discourse on what constitutes Hanoi’s heritage and how it can be sustainably preserved for the future.
The research will be conducted in collaboration with several universities, institutions, curators and practicing architectural offices, providing a robust academic framework that includes lectures on the history and design of 20th-century Vietnamese architecture. This theoretical foundation will be complemented by office visits and hands-on workshops focused on 3D scanning, photogrammetry, filmmaking, and in-depth discussions on topics such as multiple modernities and experimental preservation. Students will work collaboratively, supported by personalised tutorials and review sessions. The project will culminate in the production of short narrated films, which will be publicly screened and exhibited.
For more information, please visit here.
Scott Batty, Senior Lecturer in the School of Architecture + Cities, has been shortlisted for the RIBA East regional awards for his project 1970s House Retrofit. Batty worked with visiting consultant Structural Engineers Dave Rayment and Henry Burling (Consultants for Year 3 BArch + MArch 2).
Rosa Schiano-Phan and her student Negin Esmailzadehhanjani (MSc in Architecture and Environmental Design) carried out a study of the project’s environmental performance.
Expertise in sustainable water strategies and low-carbon technology was provided by Cath Hassell, ech2o consultants, who is also a regular visiting consultant for Year3BArch + MArch2.
The project was the principle case study for Batty’s Research Folio as part of REF2021.
Featured Image: Siobhan Doran Photography
When: Thursday, 27th of February 2025, 1pm-2pm (GMT)
Where: Online
The next Architecture + Cities Research Seminar will take place on 27 February, 13.00 – 14.00. Guy Sinclair will present aspects of his PhD research in a seminar titled Climate Assemblages: Siting Climate Knowledge Production.
The link to the seminar is here.
All are welcome.
When: Monday, 14th of October 2024 at 6.30pm (BST)
Where: M416 (Robin Evans Room), Marylebone Campus, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS
We are pleased to be joined by Mario Carpo for the 2024 Robin Evans lecture, Generative AI and architectural design, problems and perspectives both in-person and as an online streamed event.
The unexpected and phenomenal rise of Generative AI has rekindled many old and new polemics for and against the use of technology in the design professions, as well as endless–and timeless–tirades on the nature of creativity. Yet in order to try to anticipate the range of design applications of Generative AI, and their consequences, we should first try to figure out what AI is, and how it works; and based on that, what it can, and cannot do.
Mario Carpo is an architectural historian and critic, currently the Reyner Banham Professor of Architectural History and Theory at the Bartlett, University College London and the Professor of Architectural Theory at the Institute of Architecture of the University of Applied Arts (die Angewandte) in Vienna (emeritus since end 2023). His research and publications focus on history of early modern architecture and on the theory and criticism of contemporary design and technology.
This series supports outstanding scholarship in the history of architecture and allied fields, building on the work of Professor Robin Evans (1944-1993). It encourages scholars working on the relationship between the spatial and social domains in architectural drawing, construction and beyond.
Evans’ work interrogated the spaces that existed between drawing and building, geometry and architecture, teasing out the points of translation often overlooked. From his early work on prison design and domestic spaces, through to his later work on architectural geometry, Evans sought to articulate the multiple points at which the human imagination could influence architectural form. His first book, The Fabrication of Virtue, analysed the way that spatial layouts provided opportunities for social reform via their interference with morality, privacy and class. In The Projective Cast: Architecture and its Three Geometries, Evans traced the origins of the humanist tradition to understand how human form influenced architectural drawing and construction, focusing on aesthetic dimensions in the production of architectural space.
This series will provide opportunities for the creation and/or dissemination of work by scholars working on similar questions of space, temporality, and architecture. In particular, it supports work that breaks the boundaries of traditional disciplines to think though these complex networks involved in the space between human imagination and architectural production.
When: Friday, 14th of June 2024 from 4pm to 8pm (BST)
Where: Architecture studios, Marylebone Campus, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS
Book you place here.
An invitation from University of Westminster Architecture graduates to an end of year show viewing with events, presentations and drinks, and the opportunity to meet our fresh graduates.
ALL WELCOME!
When: Thursday, 21st of March 2024 at 6pm
Where: M416, Marylebone Campus, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, NW1 5LS
“On January 6, 2021, supporters of then President, Donald Trump, stormed the U.S. Capitol Building. In a stunning display of a historiographical phenomenon known as ‘presentism,’ insurrectionists desecrated the seat of American democracy, while simultaneously recording and archiving their illegal conduct. In the aftermath of the insurrection, everyday citizens, museum curators, and criminologists bagged, tagged, and collected memorabilia, artefacts for accession, and legal evidence, attesting to the day’s violent and unprecedented activities. This lecture examines the roles that architecture, and more broadly the politics of space, played in the events that unfolded that day.”
ALL WELCOME
