Tag: Technical Studies

Technical Studies Lecture Series: Mohammed Rahmany + Abderrahim Elmani from AWMA “Recent Projects”, Thursday, November 23, 2023 at 18:00 (GMT), M416 + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Thursday, 23rd of November at 6pm (GMT)

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

Based in Brixton, AWMA is an experimental design collective that explores key themes prevalent within social, spiritual, economic and urban realms – from celebrations to challenges – across the cultural spectrum with work that connects people and places. 

Mohammed is an architectural thinker and maker. Having worked for acclaimed international architecture firms over the years, he has played an instrumental role in projects, ranging from airport terminals, residential developments, sports stadiums, and several mixed-use spaces across the globe. Abderrahim is an architectural designer and dreamer. He has worked on a variety of scale projects, ranging from one-off private houses to large mixed-use master plans. His experience has been gained through several award-winning architecture practices, all of which have given him a real insight into the field. Abderrahim’s appetite for a holistic and considered approach is fundamental in any undertaken programme.  

Both Mohammed and Abderrahim are graduates of the University of Westminster and we are delighted to welcome them back to talk about their experience as a young design practice. 

For details contact Will McLean 

w.f.mclean@westminster.ac.uk 

Technical Studies Lecture Series: architect Hugo Braddick (Haworth Tompkins Architects) + client Amandeep Singh Kalra (Be First) on “Industria” | Thursday, October 12 at 18:00 (BST), M416 + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Thursday, 12th of October, 6pm (BST)

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

Architect Hugo Braddick (Haworth Tompkins Architects) talks with client Amandeep Singh Kalra (Be First) about the incredible new ‘Industria’ building in East London. 

Hugo has 20 years’ experience in delivering large, design-led construction projects for complex client bodies, on challenging urban sites, with a particular emphasis on residential and mixed-use buildings, workspace and masterplanning. Hugo leads the industrial intensification team with Graham Haworth, including the regeneration masterplan for Albert Island, a 100,000sqm brownfield development in London Docklands, in collaboration with the GLA, and Industria, an innovative 12,000sqm ramped, multi-level industrial workspace project for BeFirst, at Creek Road in Barking.Hugo currently sits on the NLA experts for logistics and industry and brings a deep working knowledge of urban industrial design at both macro and micro level, combined with an understanding of the market and development economics in the sector, and familiarity with its complex policy requirements.

Amandeep is an Architect and Urban designer. He is an Associate Director at Be First (LB Barking & Dagenham’s regeneration company), working at the intersection of public and private practice. He leads a team that is responsible for strategic visions, brief writing, research, design, and procurement, while actively engaging with residents, planners, policy makers, developers, and politicians to bring these ideas to the table. Amandeep works across urban design & architecture with over ten years’ experience across both public and private sectors. He has worked across a range of scales including large scale masterplans, regeneration schemes alongside small infill sites. More recently he has led the development of retrofit lead design codes and strategies for intensifying industrial land.

Amandeep is trustee at the charity London Neighborhood Scholarship where he continues to champion equality by providing scholarships for people from disadvantaged backgrounds. He is a Design Council Expert, member of the Bromley, Harrow, Kingston (Vice-Chair) and Hackney (Chair) Design Review Panels and was invited to join the Open City Accelerate advisory board. He has served as a guest critic at Kingston, Westminster, UCL and Sheffield University and mentors with Future of London.

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

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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. 

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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/ 

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

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.  

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

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.  

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

Technical Studies Lecture Series: Dr Pooja Basnett, University of Westminster “Bacterial Polymers” | Thursday, November 10 at 18:00 (GMT), Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Thursday, 10th of November, 6pm (GMT)

Where: ONLINE (Due to the London Underground strike action)

Dr. Pooja Basnett is a lecturer in Biological Sciences. She received a Cavendish scholarship from the University of Westminster to complete a PhD in Applied Biotechnology titled ‘Biosynthesis of Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) and their application in medical device development’. Following her PhD, she worked as a lead postdoc in the European Union-funded project – ReBioStent aimed at developing drug-eluting biodegradable stents. She also worked as a postdoc on other EU projects – NEURIMP which focused on the development of nerve conduits for peripheral nerve repair; POLYBIOSKIN – aimed at developing biocompatible and biodegradable skin contact products. She was also involved in an EPSRC funded project titled CYCLOPS which focused on the development of a wound healing patch with Artificial Intelligence (AI).  

Pooja’s research focuses on the production of bioplastics using bacteria and their application in medicine – she is also exploring other potential uses. Basnett has worked on producing novel biopolymers such as polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) via bacterial fermentation process using a range of waste streams. PHAs are naturally occurring biodegradable polymers and are a potential replacement for some petrochemical-based plastics. 

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For details contact: Will McLean  

w.f.mclean@wmin.ac.uk 

Technical Studies Lecture Series: “Carbon Negative Materials” by Allison Dring, Elegant Embellishments | Thursday, December 9, 2021 at 18:00 (GMT), Room M416, Marylebone Campus + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Thursday, 9th of December at 6pm (GMT)

Where: M416, Marylebone Campus, School of Architecture and Cities, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, London NW1 5LS 

Link to join livestream

[…] it turned out that TiO2 (titanium dioxide) is excellent for photocatalytically breaking down organic compounds.

Allison Dring 

Frustrated by a sustainable architectural palette of parsimony and the orthogonal construction grid, Elegant Embellishments (EE) designed a deliberately decorative pollution-cleaning screen, based on an aperiodic grid to ‘elicit an emotional response’. This new product was named prosolve370e in reference to the naming of cars after their engine size and how much pollution they produce. The ‘370e’ refers to how much surface enhancement the designers could achieve in order to counter that volume of pollution. Made from thermo-formed plastic to reduce weight, the modules are coated in photocatalytic titanium dioxide (TiO2). The designer and partner in EE Allison Dring explains that prosolve370e does three things: first it maximises surface area to increase the ‘efficacy of the technology’; second it creates turbulence to slow the air pollution and make it easier to catch on the surface; and third the forms of the modular screen are designed to enhance reception of light, including the reflected light of neighbouring modules. In 2012, the technology was installed at the Hospital Manuel Gea Gonzalez in Mexico City, described as ‘the incredible smog-eating building’ by CNN. 

The screen covers an area of 25,000 m2 and is thought to be the world’s largest engineered urban air-purifier. Based on the size of the screen, and its maximised surface area, EE claims to achieve around 5000 m2 of photocatalytic activity, which equates to mitigating the air pollution produced by 1,000 cars per day. Air pollution is composed of two key ingredients: oxides of nitrogen (known as NOx) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs), which are both produced by combustion engines. 

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

Technical Studies Lecture Series: “Dynamic Building Skins” by Doris Sung from DOSU Studio / University of Southern California | Thursday, December 2, 2021 at 18:00 (GMT), Room M416, Marylebone Campus + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

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

Where: M416, Marylebone Campus, School of Architecture and Cities, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, London NW1 5LS 

Link to join livestream 

‘… if we are to develop truly sustainable architecture, we don’t necessarily need more materials. We need smarter ones.’ 

Doris Sung 

In her ‘Bloom’ project, architect and inventor Doris Sung created a large lightweight monocoque structure comprised of 414 hyperbolic paraboloid (hypar) shaped panels made from a bimetal lamination of two alloys of nickel, manganese and iron with different thermal expansion coefficients. Bloom is a wonderful exposition of the properties and potential of bimetals in the creation of new responsive building skins that can passively open and close to ventilate and shade the building. An animated film of the Bloom project shows how the surface is activated by sun and shade.  

Doris Sung has subsequently developed a whole series of innovative architectural applications using thermobimetal. Her initial research on self-shading, self-ventilating and self-assembling alongside contemporary fabrication technologies has expanded the physical potential of the material, for example in the twisting and folding of her Oculus prototype, and she has now patented systems that are being commercialised for wider application. Her InVert™ window-shading system incorporates small bimetal ‘petals’ within a double-glazed glass module, and as the temperature from the sun increases, the bimetal elements deform and block the sunlight and shade the building’s interior. As the sunlight moves and the temperature cools, the bimetal elements revert to their original shape and position. The resultant solar shading reduces heat gain, which in turn can reduce artificial cooling needs by 28–42%,36 depending on the geographical location. 

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For details contact: Will McLean 

w.f.mclean@wmin.ac.uk 

Technical Studies Lecture Series: “Recent Projects” by Andy Watts, Grimshaw Architects | Thursday, November 11, 2021 at 18:00 (GMT), Room M416, Marylebone Campus + Online

Posted on by Mirna Pedalo

When: Thursday, 11th of November at 6pm (GMT)

Where: M416, Marylebone Campus, School of Architecture and Cities, University of Westminster, 35 Marylebone Road, London NW1 5LS 

Andy Watts is Grimshaw’s Director of Design Technology and oversees the application and exploration of innovative technological approaches across all Grimshaw studios, covering areas such as computational design, BIM, virtual and augmented reality technology, data-driven intelligence and DfMA.  

Andy strives to bring the benefits of design technology to as many Grimshaw projects as possible. He has worked to introduce these approaches to a range of their projects at various scales, with a range of different agendas.  

Beyond Grimshaw, Andy actively engages with the digital technology industry as well as representing the work of Grimshaw at various industry and academic events. He teaches at the Architectural Association in London and has taught at the Universities of Westminster, Lincoln, and Dundee and has organised educational workshops in Dubai and with the Pratt Institute in New York. Andy is also on the organising committee for the London VR/AR User Group which offers a platform to share Grimshaw’s leading knowledge in the field of VR with other architectural firms.  

Grimshaw was founded by Sir Nicholas Grimshaw in 1980. The practice became a Partnership in 2007 and operates worldwide with offices in four continents employing over 650 staff. Nicholas Grimshaw received the RIBA Gold medal in 2019. Notable practice projects include The Eden Project, the International Terminal at Waterloo and the Fulton Project, New York. 

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