2020 Annual General Meeting

ON THE NIGHT / A trio of talks - Bertie van Wyk informs on workplace design; past Chapter President Amrita Raja AIA summaries the past year and oversees the business meeting; new Chapter President Chris Musangi AIA looks to the future.

Although an Annual General Meeting is a serious, formal event, the AIA UK Chapter enjoys surrounding the mandatory business content with a celebration of the past year and a lookahead to the next.  Following a tradition starting in the 1990s, this year’s AGM was hosted by our long-term sponsor, Herman Miller. Herman Miller’s generous hospitality before and after the business meeting perfectly balanced commercial affairs with social enjoyment. 

Prior to the business meeting, Herman Miller’s representative, Bertie van Wyk, gave a presentation on ‘Wellbeing and Social Ergonomics in Workplace Design’.  He started his talk with startling statistics from recent research suggesting that only 8% of the UK workforce were ‘actively engaged’, 73% were ‘disengaged’ and the remaining 19% ‘best dealt with by a strong HR department’.  

Concentrating on the critical 73%, he then illustrated how social interaction and work performance could be enhanced by considering factors such as personal space, physical and psychological proximity and territoriality in new office design.  One quick-fix illustration – drag a flip chart into an office and watch the effect on idea generation...  

As ever, the Herman Miller talk was both entertaining and instructive – and earned attendees 1.0 Continuing Education credits.  If you missed the presentation, you could still check out Herman Miller’s research for office improvements HERE.     

The formal part of the AGM dealt with approval of the 2019 Accounts and the election of the 2020 Board of Directors and Officers.  Additionally, the 2019 President, Amrita Raja AIA, gave an overview presentation of the past year and the 2020 President, Chris Musangi AIA, gave a preview of plans for 2020.   These Year End Presentations can be viewed in full HERE.

The Year End Presentation also includes a summary of the 2019 Accounts, statistics on Chapter membership and a list of Board Directors and Officers. 

After business, many went home, but the party continued…

Written by: Lorraine King AIA

Looking Back / Looking Forward – AIA UK and Sustainability 10 Years On

From our Spring Newsletter 2010 (archived under News on our Website), an update on the Chapters Sustainability lecture series organised by Alex Miller, AIA, then ‘Sustainability Lecture Chair’.

The AIA UK Chapter has regularly placed sustainability on its agenda and facilitated continuing education for our members through our events program over the years. We are deeply aware this is an ongoing conversation that is taking on an ever-increasing urgency.  

In recognition of the need to heighten public awareness of the issues, AIA UK updated its Chapter Mission Statement in October 2019 to include an explicit statement on our commitment to climate change.  

The intense discussion on how to implement the Mission Statement prompted a review and update of our past efforts, in particular the 5-part Sustainability Lecture series held in 2010 (at the start of the last decade), moderated by Ana Maria Orrù of SCENE.  It has been an opportune moment to recollect the works, thoughts, and bold visions the distinguished, multidisciplinary speakers shared with us at the time and to explore briefly the trajectory of each speaker’s work in the intervening years so that we might learn even more from their further efforts and latest thinking. 

Our first speaker was Michael Pawlyn of Exploration Architecture, who spoke on the topic of biomimicry in architecture via a variety of his projects, including his work on the Eden Project in January 2010.  Michael then shared some of the same work in a TED Talk  (Technology Entertainment & Design) that November, which has now been viewed over 2 million times!  He has continued to speak publicly keynoting numerous events, and several of his other talks are also available to stream. 

Our second speaker was Ed Gillespie of Futerra, who lectured on communicating climate change in the face of a sometimes sceptical public.  Continuing to engage the public in a positive manner, Ed went on to publish Only Planet: Around the World Without Flying in 2014.  He is interviewed in this 2019 video on Slow Travel and Rebellion.  In the summer and autumn of 2019, he was involved with the installation of Beuys’ Acorns 3 at the Bloomberg Arcade, which is part of Bloomberg Philanthropies aim to inspire climate action in cities around the world.

Beuys’ Acorns 3 photo credit: Kelly Hill

In March 2010, Polly Higgins, a barrister and environmental lawyer, shared her life’s work with us and explained her campaign to protect the Earth by criminalising “ecocide”.  Polly sadly passed in the Spring of 2019 but her work continues. To highlight her legacy, we share this video presentation, the Stop Ecocide website, and the article written by George Monbiot for the Guardian in 2019 on Ecocide.

In April 2010, the trans-disciplinary group FoAM brought several members to present their projects both in Europe and East London.  The group remains actively engaged at the nexus of art, science, and sustainability by stimulating events that encourage engagement with the urban landscape – for example, their collaborators from loop.ph presented work on edible roof gardens.  Enjoy an exploration of their varied work through their website and  Autumn 2019 digest. They have since been involved with installations at the V&A called the Storm Laboratory about turbulent weather data and more recently at the Design Museum.

The final speaker in May 2010 was Dr Susannah Hagan, who spoke with us on “Filling in the Blanks: Environmental design and brown field sites”.  She has since been appointed as a Professor at the University of Westminster and published Ecological Urbanism: The Nature of the City in 2014.  Recently in December 2019, she launched the publication of Public Spaces Pre-War and Now.

We hope the above linkages serve as another way for AIA members to engage with sustainability, discourse and practice, and to inspire new ideas for the start of the new decade.  We also remind you of a more recent series of AIA UK sustainability lectures in 2019 at the Cambridge Super Saturday as we continue to build on our commitment.

http://www.aiauk.org/news/2019/9/29/aia-super-saturday-2019-cambridge-sustainability

Written by: Alex Miller AIA

An AIA UK Chapter Technical Lecture – “Workflow: Automated Architecture”

Edoardo Tibuzzi director of the p.art research group at AKT II kicks off the lecture.

As part of its commitment to provide technical lectures to our membership,  the Chapter’s Technical Lecture Coordinator, Matthew Heitel Assoc AIA, assembled a series of speakers to explore how architecture production could be facilitated through advanced technology.  The event, held on 21 Nov 2019, was generously hosted by engineering consultants AKT II and drew an impressive audience approaching 60 people at one point.  

Edoardo Tibuzzi, director of the p.art research group at AKT II (pictured in the title image), started the night’s talks with an extensive overview of AKT II’s involvement with various projects, ranging from sensor networks to drone-sculpted-housing structures (learn more about AKT’s research team HERE).

Tibuzzi explained that a key element of the AKT II’s workflow was a singular digital environment that was used to hold together the various data streams being generated by different players within each project team. His explanation was interspersed with in depth examples of the various types of data collection and exploratory design the p.art team regularly engages in for its collaboration with BIG, Zaha Hadid and a host of other renowned architects, artists, and civic organizations.

Tibuzzi was followed by Arthur Mamou-Mani of Mamou-Mani LTD (see more HERE). His talk focused on his direct physical connection to his work through his exploration of material manipulation by mechanical means, leading to a greater understanding of the emotional effects these design collaborations had on the different people involved with each project.

This physical approach to design exploration was evident throughout his presentation, embodied by technological expressions such as silkworm – the manipulation of 3D printing through code output direct from Grasshopper 3D - and exemplified by a variety of other robotically and mechanically generated projects.

This physio-mechanical approach to design was reversed in his presentation’s final project, where the mechanical actions used to translate human-led design were replaced by a swarm of volunteers, executing a magnificent spiralling desert temple from timber, sweat and meticulously envisioned sequence drawings.

Delving deeper into the mechanized manipulation of materials was Thibault Schwartz from HAL Robotics (see more HERE). His company is dedicated to providing programming solutions and design assistance for organisations looking to benefit from mechanised fabrication processes.

His presentation showcased different robotics centric fabrication strategies, including operations involving multiple robots deftly manoeuvring materials while performing additive and subtractive processes. His collaborators include XtreeE, concrete manufacturers at the forefront of concrete printing, and MX3D, metal additive manufacturing pioneers

Schwartz’s menagerie of robotics experiments and rigorous examination of how robots can work in concert within the various realms of fabrication, made evident the impending shift the AEC fields are making toward automation at the level of the maker space. After his presentation, it was easy to imagine robotics arms being a staple of architecture firms, sitting alongside now-commonplace 3D printers.

Closing out the night were Jolanta Lidwin and Fabrizio Cazzulo from Woods Bagot (see more HERE) presenting their project - a faience-clad collaboration with Ian Monroe on the Odeon Cinema tower attached to The Londoner Hotel, overlooking Leicester Square.

This 12,000+ glazed terracotta adorned, gleaming tower will be stunning, and shows an ideal avenue where robotic manufacturing processes aided not only the fabrication of the individual ceramic pieces, but also the assembly of the tiles on their subframes in preparation for installation.

Throughout the night attendees were treated to drinks and canapés, and during breaks were able to chat, network, and discuss the evening’s topics – while earning 1.5 continuing education points..

Stay tuned for the AIAUK Vimeo Channel, where you will be able to stream this lecture, the previous AIA lecture Workflow: Parametric Design in Practice - with more to come….

Written by: Matthew Heitel, Assoc. AIA

AIA INTERNATIONAL REGION CONFERENCE, SHANGHAI

In mid-November I flew East, to represent the chapter at the AIA International Region conference in Shanghai. Titled "China: New Realities” - it was an exposition on the culmination of more than 20 years of extraordinary growth, which has brought China’s architecture to the forefront of architectural practice.

The opening reception was held at Shanghai’s classic art-deco landmark, the Fairmont Peace Hotel on the Bund, and welcomed over 200 delegates and speakers, on a mild Autumn evening. The views of the Financial District across the river were stunning!

For the next three mornings, we gathered at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Shanghai’s new Pudong District. Pudong is now home to the Lujiazui Finance & Trade Zone, Shanghai Stock Exchange, and many of Shanghai's best-known buildings, such as the Oriental Pearl Tower, the Jin Mao Tower, the Shanghai World Financial Center, and the Shanghai Tower. The amount of development since 1993, that has taken place on this less developed land across from the Old City, is staggering! 

The conference mornings included lectures and presentations by top architects in China and East Asia – keynote speakers included Kris Yao, Hon. FAIA, Rocco Yim, Hon. FAIA, Li Xiaodong, FAIA, Moira Moser, FAIA, and Yungho Chang, FAIA. 

One especially interesting segment of the second morning, was the presentations by all the International Region chapters of their UN Sustainability Development Goals initiatives. I presented our chapter’s initiatives, starting with UN SDG No.13: Climate Action. I briefed the delegates on how our chapter recognised the Climate Emergency, and subsequently revised our mission statement to address this, and also covered the various efforts we have taken to address climate action. Finally, I briefed the delegates on how through our programmes and structure we have covered goal No. 5 (Gender Equality), No.7 (Affordable & Clean Energy), No.9 (Industry Innovation & Infrastructure) and No.11 (Sustainable Cities & Communities). It was interesting to see what other chapters were also doing to address the UN SDG’s, and each exchange ideas we could all incorporate for our chapters.

In the afternoons, we broke away from the conference room and visited different areas representative of Shanghai’s extraordinary development. We started with tours of the new art museums in the West Bund Arts District by talented Chinese firms Atelier Deshaus and OPEN Architecture, finishing along the expansive Riverwalk. 

In Pudong, we visited projects by KRIS YAO | ARTECH and Kengo Kuma Associates, as well as the famous super high rise towers of Lujiazui by SOM, KPF, and Gensler.

On the third afternoon we visited the historic residential streets of the Jingan District’s Former French Concession. I spent my last day back in the historic Jingang and Chenghuang Temple area, immersing myself in old Shanghai, and admiring how the old and new Shanghai blended together, with new developments being added to the ever growing skyline.

I was fascinated by all the growth and technological advancement in this vast financial hub of China. We were warmly received and taken care of, and all the talks & tours organised were very informative and exciting. I was able to meet and network with fellow architects and other professionals in attendance, who had come from all corners of the globe. The numbers in attendance was very impressive, and this conference has left a positive lasting impression on me. I am honoured to have represented the chapter, and express my gratitude and congratulations to the AIA IR & AIA Shanghai for hosting such a successful conference. We look forward to welcoming the AIA IR to London in 2021!

Written by: Chris Musangi AIA

Onerous terms must be resisted

This is another article in our legal series provided by AIA UK partner, Beale & Co.

In this month's edition of Construction Law, guest editors Will Buckby and Madeleine Kelly report that increasingly onerous conditions are being imposed on consultants, some which may not be covered by professional liability insurance. Consultants must be prepared to 'walk away' when conditions attempt to impose risks that cannot properly be managed, the urge. 

To read the full article, please click here.

Written by: Will Buckby & Madeleine Kelly of Beale & Co.

THE FILMS OF CHARLES & RAY EAMES

Just one week after our previous screening, we were back to the BFI for our final movie screening of Autumn 2019. Thanks to Dr. Mark Breeze for the loan from his home library, we screened some of the 'Films of Charles & Ray Eames.'

Most of us know the duo for their architecture and design work, but not many know that they also made over 125 films from 1-30 minutes in length. The two are ranked among the finest American designers of the 20th Century, renowned for their groundbreaking contributions to architecture, furniture design, industrial design and the photographic arts. We started with the screening of Powers of Ten, and went on to screen a selection from the box-set, which ranged from the playful to the lyrical, exploring architecture and featuring their own designs.

These movies were a good ending piece to the 2019 Movie series, and generated a jovial debate. Many thanks to all those who joined us a week after the previous screening, and for all those who have attended throughout the year! We look forward to welcoming you all back to the BFI on Tuesday 11 February 2020, for the start of our 2020 Series.

Written by: Chris Musangi AIA