Tom Avermaete

After his architecture studies in Belgium and Denmark, Tom Avermaete (b.1971, Antwerp) obtained an MSc degree and a PhD in the history and theory of architecture at the University of Leuven, Belgium. Avermaete was lecturer in the history of architecture at the University of Copenhagen (1997), leader of the Centre for Flemish Architectural Archives at the Flemish Architecture Institute (2003), as well as associate professor (2006) and full professor of architecture (2012) at Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands.

Tom Avermaete has held several visiting professorships, amongst others at the Politecnico di Milano, Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, Tokyo Institute of Technology and the University of Copenhagen. He is on the editorial board of the “OASE Journal for Architecture”, and previously of the “Journal of Architectural Education” (JAE, until 2015) and of the “Architecture in the Netherlands Yearbook” (2012-2016).

Avermaete is a member of the advisory board of the “Architectural Theory Review” and “Docomomo Journal”, and a co-editor of the series “Bloomsbury Studies in Modern Architecture” (with Janina Gosseye, Bloomsbury Academic). He is a member of the scientific board of the Jaap Bakema Centre (HNI, Rotterdam), the programme committee of the Berlage Centre for Advanced Studies in Architecture and Urban Design, and of the Global Architectural History Teaching Collaborative (GAHTC).

1. Tom Avermaete, ‘Balcony’, in Elements of Architecture
2. Living Lab: Constructing the Commons, Vienna: IKA Academy of Fine Arts/ IBA Vienna, 2018.  The commons are intensively discussed in the contemporary debate on the city. New social, economic and political perspectives on urban life have emerged. However, it is less clear what role the architecture of the city – as a common resource par excellence – can play in processes of commoning
3. Tom Avermaete, Klaske Havik, Hans Teerds (eds.), Architectural Positions: On Architecture, Modernity and the Public Sphere, Amsterdam
4. Tom Avermaete, ‘The Infrastructure of Bare Life: Another Definition of Housing from and for the Global South’

Zhang Ke

Zhang Ke is the founder of ZAO/standardarchitecture 标准营造. With a wide range of realized works, his studio has emerged as one of the most critical protagonists among the new generation of Chinese architects. The studio’s works have been exhibited and published to international acclaim. His work was acquired into New York MoMA’s Permanent Collection in 2018. He was awarded the Alvar Aalto Medal in 2017，and the Aga Khan Award for Architecture in 2016. A lengthy list of other honors includes the International Award Architecture in Stone in Verona 2011, Design Vanguard 2010, China Architecture Media Award (CAMA), Best Young Architect Prize, 2008; and the WA Chinese Architecture Award, Winning Prize, 2010 and 2006.

Zhang Ke received his Master of Architecture from the Harvard Graduate School of Design in 1998 and his Master and Bachelor of Architecture from Tsinghua University in Beijing. He has been teaching Option Studios at Harvard GSD since 2016.

1. Zhang Ke is a recipient of the 2016 Aga Khan Award for Architecture
2. Zhang Ke is a recipient of the 2017 Alvar Aalto Medal.
3. Co-living Courtyard 共生院 This project further explores a sustainable renewal strategy for the urban fabric in the Baitasi historical area in an extremely subtle way.
4. Big Messy Courtyard: Micro Yuan’Er by Joanne Bayndrain
5. Zao/standardarchitecture Micro-Hutong is an experiment carried out by studio Standardarchitecture in the district of Dashilar in Beijing. A building imagined in 2012 and translated from wood to reinforced concrete in 2016.

Alejandro Aravena

Alejandro Aravena is the founder of Alejandro Aravena Architects. Since 2001 he has been leading ELEMENTAL, a “Do Tank” focusing on projects of public interest and social impact, including housing, public space, infrastructure and transportation.ELEMENTAL has built work in Chile, the United States, Mexico, China and Switzerland. After the 2010 earthquake and tsunami that hit Chile, ELEMENTAL was called to work on the reconstruction of the city of Constitucion, Chile. Aravena’s partners in ELEMENTAL are Gonzalo Arteaga, Juan Cerda, Victor Oddó and Diego Torres.

He was the Director of the Venice Architecture Biennale 2016. He was a speaker at TEDGlobal in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 2014. Aravena was a member of the Pritzker Architecture Prize Jury from 2009 to 2015.Aravena was a Professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Design (2000 and 2005); and also taught at Istituto Universitario di Architettura di Venezia (2005), Architectural Association in London (1999), and London School of Economics. He has held the ELEMENTAL Copec Chair at Universidad Católica de Chile since 2006.

In 2010 he was named International Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects and identified as one of the 20 new heroes of the world by Monocle magazine. He is a Board Member of the Cities Program of the London School of Economics since 2011; Regional Advisory Board Member of the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies; Board Member of the Swiss Holcim Foundation since 2013; Foundational Member of the Chilean Public Policies Society; and Leader of the Helsinki Design Lab for SITRA, the Finnish Government Innovation Fund. He was one of the 100 personalities contributing to the Rio +20 Global Summit in 2012.

Rahul Mehrotra

Rahul Mehrotra is the founder principal of RMA Architects. He divides his time between working in Mumbai and Boston and teaching at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University where he is Professor of Urban Design and Planning and the John T. Dunlop Professor in Housing and Urbanization. Mehrotra is a member of the steering committee of the Laxmi Mittal South Asia Institute at Harvard. In 2012-2015, he led a Harvard University-wide research project with Professor Diana Eck, called The Kumbh Mela: Mapping the Ephemeral Mega City. This work was published as a book in 2014. This research was extended in 2017 in the form of a book titled Does Permanence Matter? This research was also extended into an invited exhibition at the 2016 Venice Biennale. Mehrotra co-authored a book titled Taj Mahal: Multiple Narratives which was published in Dec 2017. His latest book to be released in early September 2020 is titled Working in Mumbai and is a reflection on his 30 years of practice and interrogates the notion of context to understand how the practice evolved through its association with the city of Bombay/Mumbai

Books and other resources:

1. The City as a Commons; Yale Law and Policy by Sheila R. Foster and  Christian Iaione
2. Common Space: The city as Commons by Stavros Stavrides