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Dick van Gameren has been the dean of the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment since 1 April 2019. He studied Architecture in Delft and graduated cum laude in 1988. For a long time, he ran his own architecture firm and in 2013 became a partner with Mecanoo Architecten in Delft. Over the years he has realised numerous projects, ranging from exhibition designs to urban-development master plans. Examples of his designs include residential buildings in IJburg and the Eastern Docklands area of Amsterdam and in the Westelijke Tuinsteden neighbourhood of the city. His design for the Dutch Embassy in Ethiopia won him the prestigious Aga Khan Award in 2007. It is just one of the many awards he has received. Recently, he won the Rijnlandse Architectuurprijs with his design for the Langebrug student housing project in Leiden. He has been Professor of Dwelling at the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment since 2006, and chairman of the Architecture Department for ten years; his responsibilities include managing an international teaching and research network aimed at tackling the problem of affordable housing in rapidly expanding cities in Asia and Africa.

Georg Vrachliotis is Professor and Head of the Theory of Architecture and Digital Culture Group, TU Delft. From 2016 Georg was dean of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) Faculty of Architecture and Chair for Architecture Theory (2014-2020). Previously he conducted research at the Institute for the History and Theory of Architecture at ETH Zurich. He studied architecture at the Berlin University of the Arts, did his PhD at the ETH Zurich. and was a visiting researcher at the UC Berkeley Department of Architecture in California. He is the author and co-editor of several books on the history and theory of design and digital culture, such as “Complexity. Design Strategy and World View” (2008), “Simulation. Presentation Technique and Cognitive Tool” (2008), “Code. Between Operation and Narration.” (2010), and “Datatopia” (ARCH+ special issue, 2019). He recently published “The New Technological Condition. Architecture and Design in the Age of Cybernetics” (2022). Georg co-curated the exhibitions “Fritz Haller. Architect and Researcher” at the S AM Swiss Architecture Museum in 2014, “Sleeping Beauty. Reinventing Frei Ottos Multihalle” on the occasion of the 16th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale in 2018, and recently “Models, Media and Methods. Frei Otto’s Architectural Research” at the School of Architecture at Yale University (2020). Georg is member of the advisory board of the magazine ARCH+, external examiner at Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL London, and academic advisory board member of the Jaap Bakema Study Centre at The Het Nieuwe Instituut, Museum for Architecture, Design and Digital Culture in Rotterdam.

Design Perspective: Open data has great potential in the design of sustainable space. Open data exists on urban mobility, water infrastructure, energy consumption and the use of public spaces, but data on the design of buildings is comparatively scarce. The New Open aims to close that gap in climate-conscious design.

30 min talk, 10 min Q & A

Kees Kaan is founder of KAAN Architecten and was lead architect on iconic buildings such as the Supreme Court of the Netherlands, The Hague, and the Institut des Sciences Moléculaire d’Orsay, Paris. His projects have been internationally awarded, and he was shortlisted for the Mies van der Rohe Award 2015. Kaan has been a practice professor of Architectural Design at the TU Delft since 2006, where in 2012 he founded 'Complex Projects' to merge architecture and urbanism to foster analytical and critical thinking skills on any scale projects in the city.

Format: 30 min talk, 10 min Q&A

Mathew Vola is a structural engineer and project director with work spanning Europe, Australia and East Asia. At Arup, he leads multi-disciplinary engineering teams in the design of social infrastructure projects, from airports to highrises to healthcare facilities. As head of Arup’s property business in the Netherlands, Vola is working to harness digital innovation for next-generation buildings that meet the requirements of our current and future technological progress.

Format: 30 min talk, 10 min Q&A

Martha Tsigkari is a Senior Partner, architect & Design Systems Analyst at Foster + Partners where she specialises in computational and performance-driven design, human-computer interaction, machine learning, robotics and optimisation. She has investigated the use of deep neural networks and genetic algorithms in the design process, aiming to solve problems ranging from passively actuated micromaterials to performance-driven urban layouts. She is particularly interested in the potential of disruptive technologies to revolutionise the design-to-construction process. Martha is an Associate Professor at University College London, teaching postgraduate students at The Bartlett.

Format: 30 min talk, 10 min Q&A

Seul Lee is a Landscape Architect and an Urban designer at Snøhetta where she specializes in the topic of Blue-Green Infrastructure. After practicing her skills at MVRDV in the Netherlands and Atelier Dreiseitl in Germany, Seul joined Snøhetta in 2019. She has played key roles in high profile landscape architecture, urban design and urban planning projects in Europe and East Asia with her knowledge of stormwater management, such as, Budapest South Gate Master plan in Hungary.

Format: 30 min talk, 10 min Q&A

Narrative perspective: Data is not just counting, it’s the recounting of our communal digital journeys. Unlocking the narrative of these journeys through storytelling transforms data into knowledge and wisdom, which gives it meaning. The New Open aims to harness meaningful data into changemaking built environments.

Sarah Williams is an Associate Professor of Technology and Urban Planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) & Director of the Civic Data Design Lab and the Leventhal Center for Advanced Urbanism. She is also co-founder and developer of Envelope.city, and author of Data Action, which details a process she uses to expose urban policy issues to broad audiences & create civic change. Her design work has been widely exhibited, from the Guggenheim through the Venice Biennale. Williams was named one of the top 25 technology planners and Game Changer by Metropolis Magazine.

Format: 35 min talk, 10 min Q&A

Roberto Bottazzi is an architect, researcher, and Associate Professor as well as programme Director of the Master in Urban Design at The Bartlett, UCL. He has been visiting Professor at the Politecnico of Milan and visiting tutor at the Innovation Design Engineering [IDE] at the Royal College of Art, and he lectures and exhibits internationally. His research analyses the impact of digital technologies on architecture and urbanism. He is the author of Digital Architecture beyond Computers: Fragments of a Cultural History of Computational Design  and editor of Walking Cities: London.

Format: 35 min talk, 10 min Q&A

Andrew Witt is a designer trained in architecture and mathematics who works at the crossroads of architecture and digital media. As Associate Professor in Practice of Architecture at Harvard University, he uncovers the relationship of geometry and machines to perception, design and culture. He is author of Formulations: Encodings of Architecture, Mathematics, and Culture and co-founder, with Tobias Nolte, of Certain Measures. He has solved complex geometric challenges for major building projects like the Fondation Louis Vuitton, Louvre Abu Dhabi and Qatar National Museum.

Format: 35 min talk, 10 min Q&A

Global change perspective: Data is jurisdictionless, it covers all human life across digital space and allows us to imagine our future as a more global whole. What new forms of collaboration will develop in the global open data future among cities, institutions and citizens? The New Open will look at the potential social, cultural and political change on the horizon.

Dirk van den Heuvel is an Associate Professor in Architectural Design and Dwelling at TU Delft. He is co-founder & head of the Jaap Bakema Study Centre at Het Nieuwe Instituut in Rotterdam, with an expertise in postwar modern architecture and planning, and their related fields of architecture theory and history, cultural studies and discourse analysis. He is author of Habitat: Ecology Thinking in Architecture, Jaap Bakema and the Open Society, and co-author of Architecture and the Welfare State. He was recipient of a Richard Rogers Fellowship from Harvard University for his research project 'Socio-plastics' on New Brutalism in architecture in British welfare state politics. He curates related exhibitions, including at the Dutch national pavilion at the Venice Biennale.

Panel Discussion: Sarah Williams (Civic Data Design Lab, MIT), Andrew Witt (Certain Measures, Harvard University), Kees Kaan (KAAN Architecten), Seul Lee (Snøhetta)