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About ACADIA
ACADIA was formed for the purpose of facilitating communication and critical thinking regarding the use of computers in architecture, planning and building science. The organization is committed to the research and development of computational methods that enhance design creativity, rather than simply production, and that aim at contributing to the construction of humane physical environments. A particular focus is education and the software, hardware and pedagogy involved in education. Please visit the main ACADIA website for more information.
ACADIA 2020 Theme
Acadia 2020 invites contributions on how hybrids & haecceities poses new ideas and approaches to design; be these computational, material, aesthetic, robotic, genetic, biological, environmental, or theoretical.
Organizers
Conference Chairs
Hina Jamelle
ACADIA 2020 Conference Co-Chair
Senior Lecturer. Director of Urban Housing. School of Design, University of Pennsylvania. Contemporary Architecture Practice.
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Bio:
Hina Jamelle teaches Graduate Option Studios at the University of Pennsylvania where she also directs the second year Urban Housing Studios of the Master of Architecture Program. She is co-director of the New York and Shanghai-based firm Contemporary Architecture Practice (CAP). CAP’s projects have been exhibited extensively including the firm’s 2008 commission by the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) for its show, “Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling.” Hina’s publications include the AD volume Elegance [2007] and a forthcoming book titled UNDER PRESSURE in 2020. Jamelle’s notable honors and awards include the Architectural Design Vanguard Award in 2004. In 2005 she was featured in Phaidon’s 10x10x2 as one of the world's top 100 emerging architects. In 2015, her project, IWI Orthodontics in Tokyo, Japan, was featured in Phaidon’s ROOM 100 as one of the most creative interior design projects of the year. Also in 2015, she was featured in 50 Under 50 Innovators of the 21st Century.
Dorit Aviv
ACADIA 2020 Conference Co-Chair
Assistant Professor of Architecture School of Design, University of Pennsylvania
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Bio:
Dorit Aviv is a designer and researcher specializing in the fields of energy and ecology. Her work investigates the relationships between thermodynamics, architectural geometry and material science. Prior to PennDesign, Aviv taught at The Cooper Union, Pratt Institute, and Princeton University and has practiced in design roles at Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects, Kohn Pedersen Fox, and Atelier Raimund Abraham. She holds a B.Arch from the Cooper Union, an M.Arch from Princeton University and is now completing her PhD research in architectural technology at Princeton University. Her research projects include a prototype for combined evaporative and radiative cooling roof device for desert climate, being built in full scale at Tuscon, Arizona in collaboration with Aletheia Ida, an experimental pavilion built in Singapore to allow radiant cooling below the dew point and the curation of the energy pavilion in the 2017 Seoul Biennale for Architecture and Urbanism with Forrest Meggers. Her design projects have been previously featured in the Lisbon Architecture Triennale and The New Museum Ideas City. Her work has been supported by a number of grants and awards including a National Science Foundation grant in 2018, a Tides Foundation grant in 2015, the Suzanne Kolarik Underwood Prize for exceptional achievement in architectural design in 2014.
Robert Stuart Smith
ACADIA 2020 Conference Co-Chair
Assistant Professor of Architecture, Director of the AML-UPENN, School of Design, University of Pennsylvania
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Bio:
Robert is the founding director of two Autonomous Manufacturing Labs, one based in Architecture (AML-Penn) and the other in Computer Science (AML-UCL) where he conducts funded research on multi-robot fabrication and construction, and generative design. He is an Assistant Professor of Architecture at the University of Pennsylvania and a Principal Research Associate in the Department Of Computer Science at University College Of London. Robert is currently a Co-PI for Aerial Additive Building Manufacturing (Aerial ABM) — A $\pounds$2.4mil EPSRC Funded Research Project developing an autonomous multi-agent robotic 3d printing system for in-situ building construction. Robert's academic research is supported by substantial industry experience. He consulted Cecil Balmond on computational design-engineering research in Arup's Advanced Geometry Unit for a number of years and has extensive building project experience with leading architectural practices in Melbourne and London, and through Robert's own design practice - Robert Stuart-Smith Design (RSSD), a UK-based practice engaged in state of the art building projects including an additive manufactured concrete house. Robert has also undertaken entrepreneurial ventures, co-founding computational research group Kokkugia, and more recently the technology company Behavioural Robotics. Prior to moving to the US, he was a Studio Course Master at the Architectural Association School of Architecture in London for eight years and has also taught architecture at University of Innsbruck, RMIT University, Washington University, and UEL.
Masoud Akbarzadeh
ACADIA 2020 Conference Co-Chair
Assistant Professor of Architecture, Director of Polyhedral Structures Laboratory, School of Design, University of Pennsylvania
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Bio:
Masoud Akbarzadeh was one the first people to develop the methods of 3DGS based on the original proposition by Maxwell and Rankine. His previous background in structural engineering, architecture, and computational design make him uniquely suited to address this interdisciplinary research at the intersection of architecture, engineering, computer science, mathematics, material science, and digital fabrication. Dr. Akbarzadeh is a designer with a unique academic background and experience in architectural design, computation, and structural engineering. He is an Assistant Professor of Architecture in Structures and Advanced Technologies at the School of Design, University of Pennsylvania and the Director of the Polyhedral Structures Laboratory (PSL). He holds a D.Sc. from the Institute of Technology in Architecture, ETH Zurich, where he was a Research Assistant in the Block Research Group. He holds two degrees from MIT: a Master of Science in Architecture Studies (Computation) and a MArch, the thesis for which earned him the renowned SOM award. He also has a degree in Earthquake Engineering and Dynamics of Structures from the Iran University of Science and Technology and a BS in Civil and Environmental Engineering. His main research topic is Three-Dimensional Graphical Statics, which is a novel geometric method of structural design in three dimensions. In 2020, he has received the National Science Foundation CAREER Award to extend the methods of 3D/Polyhedral Graphic Statics for Education, Design, and Optimization of High-Performance Structures.
Ferda Kolatan
ACADIA 2020 Project/Exhibition Chair
Associate Professor of Practice, School of Design, University of Pennsylvania
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Bio:
Ferda Kolatan is an Associate Professor of Practice at PennDesign and the founding director of su11 in New York City. He received his Architectural Diploma with distinction from the RWTH Aachen in Germany and his Masters in Architecture from Columbia University, where he was awarded the LSL Memorial Prize and the Honor Award for Excellence in Design. Kolatan has lectured widely and taught design studios as well as theory and fabrication seminars at Columbia University, Cornell University, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, University of British Columbia, California College of the Arts, Washington University, Pratt Institute, and the RWTH Aachen. He is also a co-author of the book Meander: Variegating Architecture (Bentley Press, 2010) and was selected as a Young Society Leader by the American Turkish Society in 2011. su11 is an award-winning practice with international acclaim. It received the ICFF Editor’s Award for Best New Designer and the Swiss National Culture Award for Art and Design in 2001. In 2009, su11 was chosen as a contributor to Journey to Zero, an initiative towards a Zero Emission future and sponsored by Nissan and TED founder Richard Saul Wurman. It was also nominated as a finalist for the prestigious Chernikhov Price both in 2007 and 2010 and the MoMA/PS1 Young Architects Program in 2008. su11 has exhibited work at such venues as MoMA, Walker Art Center, Vitra Design Museum, Beijing Biennale, Carnegie Museum of Art, Archilab Orleans, Art Basel, Documenta X, Artists Space NY, PS1, Istanbul Design Biennial and the Siggraph and Acadia conferences. Publications include Archilab's Futurehouse, Space, Monitor, L'Arca, Arch+, AD, Dwell, Le Monde, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, Suedeutsche Zeitung, and the Washington Post.
Kutan Ayata
ACADIA 2020 Project/Exhibition Chair
Senior Lecturer, School of Design, University of Pennsylvania
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Bio:
Kutan Ayata is an architect and an educator practicing in New York City where he is a founding partner of the architecture and urban design practice Young & Ayata. Kutan was a fellow at Princeton University School of Architecture and earned his Masters of Architecture degree in 2004 as a recipient of the Suzanne Kolarik Underwood Thesis Prize. While at Princeton, he represented the School of Architecture in the FIPSE academic exchange programs in Los Angeles and Paris, in addition to an academic/professional exercise to rethink the future of Midtown-West Manhattan initiated by the Newman Real Estate Institute of New York. He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts in Architecture in 1999 from Massachusetts College of Art in Boston with studies including at Rhode Island School of Design in Providence and Mimar Sinan University in Istanbul. Prior to forming Young & Ayata, Kutan worked at Reiser+Umemoto, Agrest & Gandelsonas and Friedrich St. Florian Architect. His international professional experience includes projects for urban scale master-plans, cultural institutions, transportation buildings, commercial/mix-use high-rises and high-end residences. He is a registered architect in the Chamber of Architects in Turkey.
Andrew Saunders
ACADIA 2020 Workshop Chair
Associate Professor of Architecture, School of Design, University of Pennsylvania
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Bio:
Andrew Saunders is an Associate Professor of Architecture at PennDesign and founding principal of Andrew Saunders Architecture + Design, an internationally published, award winning architecture, design and research practice committed to the tailoring of innovative digital methodologies to provoke novel exchange and reassessment of the broader cultural context. The practice innovates at a number of scales ranging from product design, exhibition design, and residential and large-scale civic and cultural institutional design. He received his Bachelor of Architecture from the University of Arkansas and a Masters in Architecture with Distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Design. His current practice and research interests lie in computational geometry as it relates to aesthetics, emerging technology, fabrication and performance. He has significant professional experience as project designer for Eisenman Architects, Leeser Architecture and Preston Scott Cohen, Inc. He has taught and guest lectured at a variety of institutions, including Cooper Union and the Cranbrook Academy of Art, and, most recently, he was Assistant Professor of Architecture & Head of Graduate Studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York. In 2004 he was awarded the SOM Research and Traveling Fellowship for Masters of Architecture to pursue his research on the relationship of equation-based geometries to early 20th century pioneers in reinforced concrete. His current practice and research interests lie in computational geometry as it relates to emerging technology, fabrication and performance. He is currently working on a book using parametric modeling as an analysis tool of 17th century Italian Baroque architecture. Most recently Andrew won the ACADIA international fabrication competition for the production of the Luminescent Limacon. The design for this lighting fixture was inspired by Flemish baroque portraits of the Dutch ruff and builds on computational and material research from his seminar Equation-based Morphologies.
Nathan Hume
ACADIA 2020 Media Chair
Lecturer, School of Design, University of Pennsylvania
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Bio:
Nathan Hume is a partner at Hume Coover Studio with Abigail Hume. Hume Coover Studio strives to engage popular culture and contemporary architectural form through built and speculative projects, with an emphasis on experimenting with the organization of space through complex geometry, innovative materials, and counter-intuitive planning. Nathan received his Masters of Architecture from the Yale University School of Architecture. Nathan and Abigail's work and writings have been published in the New York Times, Wired, Metropolis, Tarp, and Project and exhibited at the Yale University School of Architecture, the New York Center for Architecture and the Museum of Modern Art. Abigail and Nathan are also co-creators and editors of suckerPUNCHdaily.com a website that reviews the work of contemporary artists, architects and designers who offer the stunningly unexpected and beautiful. Through suckerPUNCH they mounted the exhibition Fresh Punches at the Land of Tomorrow gallery and published the accompanying book.