Weathering
Barry Wark
The studio explores architecture that reflects our contemporary understanding of ecology and the interconnectedness of all matter, living or otherwise. It investigates how this understanding of the environment might impact how we design and construct the built environment and its spatial and cultural implications. This premise is investigated through novel ecological aesthetics encompassing weathering and the permissible degradation of building elements, designing novel spatial conditions for cohabitation by human and non-human agents, and parts-focused tectonics that more readily enable regenerative building structures facilitated by circular materials.
Project
Students will work in teams of 3 to create a facade intentionally designed to weather and display its enmeshment with the Melbourne biome. To avoid trending solely toward ruin and obsolescence, the facades will be conceived as a series of parts with different performative and temporal presences. Some parts might provide structure and therefore require more ‘permanent,’ while others could be designed to weather and be replaced and thus ‘impermanent’. Rather than seeing this as a surface condition, projects will imagine how this idea might become inhabitable and immersive through notions of poche and layering of different conditions and barriers we typically associate with contemporary façade design.
Computational Tools
The studio is invested in exploring these projects through avant-garde computational tools. Projects will be iteratively developed through rhino3D and procedural modeling workflows in Houdini Fx, embedding climate information and the students’ design intent. Students are not expected to have prior knowledge of these tools before joining the studio. Still, some computational design experience in 3D modeling software and a strong desire to learn them will be essential.
This studio will require you to have access to a computer with at least CPU Intel i7, GPU 3060 8GB and RAM 32GB. If you do not have access to a machine with this specification, there are always work around and an options for cloud computing which will come with additional costs.
Deliverables
The studio’s main deliverable will be a large 3D-printed model that demonstrates your tectonic system. This model will also be accompanied by associated drawings that explain your project and design intent.
The most efficient way to fabricate your model is to buy your own team 3D Printer, which could cost between $200 and $300. Filament costs will be in addition to this. These costs shared amongst team members should equate to no more than $150$ per person.
Format
This is an intensive studio
The class will moslty be run via Zoom online Tuesday 9.30-13.30 & Friday 9.30-13.30 (in person Aug 9th-22nd)
Mid Review: Aug 22nd- In Person
Final Review: Sep 20th- Online with International Guests
It is highly advised that you also take Barry Wark’s elective ‘ Vibrant Detials’ if taking this studio
Tutor:
Physical Models from AAD Studio at Weitzman School of Design
AI ACCELERATED ARCHITECT
Prof Dr Alisa Andrasek // https://www.alisaandrasek.com/ // https://linktr.ee/nDarchitecture MASTERS STUDIO Tuesdays 9.30 AM - 1.30 PM / 100.04.004
A true superpower of architecture has always been in the complex synthesis of many elements, now accelerated by the synthetic capacities of generative AI. It enables us to create entirely new categories of designs, buildings, and territorial systems, upgrade existing ones, and merge the physical and digital worlds in previously unimaginable ways. With generative AI models, we can incorporate aesthetic preferences through multimodal references, tap into the code of creativity, and a particular designer’s signature. Addressing the planetary challenges, the studio emphasises systemic design strategies for complexity. Students are tasked with envisioning novel living environments that integrate social, technological and natural systems, capturing glimpses of future architectural tectonics co-designed with green biomass, physics of air, emergent materialities, and new social and mobility patterns. Complex machinic patterns, discretisation and reconfigurable modular building blocks in large populations will be the substrate of construction logic for novel architectural fabrics at a high resolution. Following the results of previous AIAA studios, we will further evolve a new typology of hybrid human/nonhuman built environments, with 20% human inhabitation at high density and 80% life-supporting programs such as food and energy production, data farms and dark factories. These projects aim to mitigate environmental impact, support new economic and social patterns, and uncover future architectural aesthetics. The studio draws inspiration from a broad spectrum of thinkers, from Jeremy Rifkin’s insights on resilience to Benjamin Bratton’s computational understanding of the planet.
The computational workflow will incorporate the latest in generative AI platforms, including LLM (like ChatGPT) and diffusion models (such as Midjourney and Stable Diffusion with custom LORA and ControlNet). Prior proficiency with Rhino is strongly encouraged. Students will work in teams.
| CHAMELEON
| Outline
Chameleon will explore the design of complex topologies and the translation of intricate ornamentation through panelization and aggregation. This studio will follow the lineage of “Painterly Forms” & “Hereditary” studios and look at the negotiation between generative processes and top-down modelling.
making using a combination of 3D printing, plastic postproduction techniques and clay sculpting. Initially students will explore spatial modelling by creating complex digital forms and fabricating digital sculptures through FDM printing and physical model making. Students will translate these techniques by developing a series of architectural tectonic “chunks” that tackle a range of programs & spatial conditions.
sculpting and 3d print optimization to produce a wide array of digital sculptures & Architectural tectonics. of geometry and top down intervention through sculpting.
The second half of the semester will see students design a mid-rise sculpture gallery that negotiates the materiality and surrounding architectural vernacular. The weekly aggregation of objects will act as a taxonomy of formal characteristics that will be referred to when designing their architectural language.
|
Physical Model Making & Material Costs
Students will be producing physical models using the Hololens, 3D printers & Laser Cutting. Please note that there will be material costs for clay, plaster and 3D printing (PLA & Resin). There are 3D print facilities at RMIT however there can be long lead times. Most students in previous semesters purchased their own 3D printer (Roughly $200-$250).
| Software
No prior experience in ZBrush or Coding required. Communications 3 or equivalent Grasshopper experience is required.
| Evaluation
Students will be assessed on their design, visual communication and comprehension of algorithmic process. Individual folios are to be submitted at the conclusion of this subject.
| Tectonic Formation Lab
The studio is part of a group of studios and electives run this semester that are aligned with the RMIT Architecture | Tectonic Formations Lab, which will collaborate through combined reviews and symposia.
Speculative History
Peak Bureaucracy
Wed 6pm Wed
Paul van Herk Paul van
This Masters of Architecture studio will involve the speculative design of 14 Ha
This Masters of Architecture studio will involve the of 14 Ha of the Arden urban renewal precinct surrounding the new station. The studio of the Arden urban renewal precinct the new station. The studio will begin with a generative architectural sur vey of powerful bureaucracies will with a generative architectural survey of bureaucracies which designed and built buildings, precincts and cities without outsourcing to which and built precincts and cities without outsourcing to a dominant mercantile sector. The studio will look at 1100s Byzantinium, 1870s a dominant mercantile sector. The studio will look at 1100s Byzantinium, 1870s German/US postal ser vices, 1950s Krushchevka/Plattenbau housing, and German/US services, 1950s Krushchevka/Plattenbau and 1970s GAO civic architecture in Australia as key references 1970s GAO civic architecture in Australia as key references.
In the first half of semester students will work in rotating groups to synthesise In the first half of semester students will work in groups to these historical precedent with one other avante garde ‘world-building’ project. these historical with one other avante project. These will be set against existing visions for Arden in government press releases. These will be set against existing visions for Arden in government press releases.
In the second half of semester, students will work individually on projects that In the second half of semester, students will work on projects that contain a specific critique of contemporar y bureaucracy by proposing a spatial contain a critique of contemporary proposing a alternative that maximises its most compelling tendencies at its peak. alternative that maximises its most tendencies at its
The studio will expose students to political theor y, historical context and cultural
The studio will expose students to theory, historical context and cultural criticism that will have to be conver ted into spatial and stylistic propositions criticism that will have to be converted into and week by week Students should be ready to read, do their own research and week week. Students should be to read, do their own research and iterate their way comedically through precinct-scale complexity. iterate their way
PRACTICE STUDIO
UPPER POOL DESIGN STUDIO
SEMESTER 2 / 2024
STANLEY / EGGLESTON
At March Studio, we believe that quality of life and wellbeing can be positively affected by the physical environment around us. We create spaces and places where human relationships are improved by the world in which we live, work, and play.
Our philosophy is grounded in the diverse multidisciplinary team that is March Studio, including architecture, graphic, interiors and industrial design. Closely aligned to the Architecture School at RMIT, March Studio consistently run Upper Pool Design Studio’s from their studio in North Melbourne.
The exact design challenge or subject focus changes from semester to semester, but the themes, attitude, and the personal are consistent.
Themes that are covered include;
Buildability. At March Studio, we believe strongly in ideas translating to a built reality. We encourage students to design using materials and construction techniques that can be translated into the real world. Whilst we will explore the edge of this condition we still expect students to produce drawings of buildings. We have a breadth of knowledge in this field and a strong focus on producing buildable architecture rather than theoretical or 'paper architecture.'
March Studio asks students to look architecture can make a positive impact on the public life of cities and towns across Australia. The studios we run will always embody a simple ethos of WHY (Why are you doing it), WHAT (what is it you are doing) and WHO (who would care to pay, permit, or be the end user of the project). We will typically give you there WHERE which is, we will prescribe a site and a condition that we feel could be remodelled or improved through architectural intervention.
Social amenity and ecological sustainability are embraced, usually this means an output of a community-beneficial building typology. In the past we have investigated surf life saving clubs, eco tourism in old military buildings, community centres, co-ops, emergency and social housing. We are interrested in helping students uncover the social benefits of good, simple architecture.
Adaptive reuse and/or activating heritage for positive outcomes is more often than not explored. We will choose sites and/or buildings that we feel could work a little harder. We will challenge local planning laws and stereotyped models to achieve better outcomes for an imagined end user.
Technique and tectonic is your individual voice, and we will help students embrace thier individuality.
__
Semester 2 / 2021 Quarantine III __ Semester 1 / 2022 Quarantine III __
Semester 1 / 2023 Quarantine IV __ Semester 2 / 2023 Quarantine V __
Semester 1 / 2024 Land Saving Club __ Semester 2 / 2024 Practice Studio __
Studios will be run from March Studio in North Melbourne at 5pm each Tuesday night. Tutors from March Studio will be introduced according to the themes explored in that week.
Semester 1 / 2017 March Studio Studio __ Semester 2 / 2020 Quarantine __ Semester 1 / 2021 Quarantine II
Housing Atlas_
Practice
Kerstin Thompson
Architects
Institution
RMIT Masters of Architecture
Semester 02, 2024
Time
Wednesdays
5:00pm - 9:00pm
Location
KTA Office, North Melbourne
Tutors
Hannah Wilson
Olivia Peel
Leo Showell
Caleb Lee
Kerstin Thompson
Agenda
Despite over a century of exemplary multi-residential case studies throughout the country, Australia sinks deeper into a housing crisis while continuing to look overseas for solutions. Housing Atlas for Australia aims to document and critically evaluate important and instructive housing case studies designed and realised in Australia with a focus on medium to high density models, culminating in a print publication.
National Studio
This studio is part of nationwide research project and design studio program that runs concurrently across most schools of architecture, all working towards a shared resource – an atlas of housing for Australia. The studio will run in two parts:
1. Documentation and analysis of selected local housing exemplars. These will be compiled towards the Housing Atlas for Australia
2. Sensitive transformation of an exemplar framed through a particular issue
The Atlas
The publication will address a critical gap in current regional research, representing essential knowledge for scholars and architects alike. Comprising student research and documentation from across the country, the resulting database will form an invaluable guide to assist in the intensive delivery of new housing throughout Australia. Nationally shared lectures and resources will be a part of the delivery of this studio, The Atlas will be a contribution to Australian architectural history.
Exploration
After five weeks of documentation and analysis, students will question the future value these case studies hold. From forming a brief to articulating a detailed design response, we will test how these exemplary works can be adapted, reworked or built upon to meet the growing needs of a future Australia.
Can we draw from our local fabric in addressing the housing demands of our future? How should we be looking to renew and revive housing of architectural significance?
Precedent: City Edge Housing, Daryl Jackson & Evan Walker, 1974, South Melbourne, VIC.
YALUKIT WEELAM 2.0
The design of Australian cities post colonisation have failed to include First Peoples voices, cultures and traditions within them. How can we embrace the cultures, voices and knowledges of our First Peoples within our future built environments and how might this lead to new experimentations within architecture?
The studio is led by an unique teaching team that combines the architectural knowledge of Dr Christine Phillips &
You will be asked to design a First Peoples Arts, Music & Cultural building in the heart of Boon Wurrung Country at the St Kilda Triange site to explore:
• How architecture can respectfully engage with First Peoples knowledge and knowledge holders within our built environment.
•How First Peoples notions of Country can be explored within an urban context.
•How Boon Wurrung knowledges and culture might inspire new forms of architecture that provides a new cultural identity for St Kilda/ Euro Yuroke.
• How architecture can facilitate a healing of Country in a culturally & environmentally sustainable way through a deep understanding of place and site within the context of the Eastern Kulin Nation.
• How architecture can facilitate long term cultural, economic opportunities for First Peoples.
A Master of Architecture Design Studio led by Dr Christine Phillips, Stasinos Mantzis & Carolyn Briggs AM
Studio times: Tuesdays 9.30am - 1.30pm
artist credit: Reko Rennie
Coburg Iterations
Master of Architectural Design
Studio Semester 2 2024
Tuesdays 9.30am - 1.30pm
Lead by Lauren Garner and Jan van Schaik
This studio invites students to engage in an exploration of urban redevelopment, focusing on central Coburg.
In collaboration with Merribek City Council and RMIT PlaceLab, students will investigate and propose innovative urban and architectural interventions to address contemporary urban challenges in Central Coburg.
The studio will integrate theoretical and practical perspectives to develop speculative and ‘disruptive’ urban strategies that
balance community needs, environmental stewardship, and economic resilience.
This studio blends speculative architectural design with practical engagement, equipping students with the
the design of complex urban conditions.
Working in pairs, students will develop a series of speculative strategies, design instruments, and metrics for evaluation toward imagining radically Coburg.
Typical System
Transit infrastructures perform a fundamental role in our experience of the urban environment. As much in their primary function; as they enable us to get about in cars, trains, trams, and bikes. As in their secondary role; as pedestrians navigate the spatial consequences of underpasses, bike lanes, crossovers, shoulders & verges. Where the petrodependent road network begins and ends in the private dwelling - the electrified public transit system finds its headwater in vast sheds of the city’s middle suburbs.
Between 1913 & 1983, the state owned Melbourne & Metropolitan Tramways Board (MMTB) extended & constructed 12 of the city’s now 13 Tram Depots. These sites were either inherited from private trusts with in-house architects or otherwise newly built and renovated by the state’s Public Works Department (PWD). Typically an architect would be employed to design the buildings that addressed a main street - whereas a new shed or workshop would be tendered directly to a builder.
As a largely flat & loose city with pockets of intense density, Melbourne hosts the bulk of its many types of traffic on a single ground plane. The overlapping needs ofthese different use groups produces a unique choreography supported by complex systems of signs, sounds & maintenance. As sites where this traffic is most concentrated, the Tram Depots present an opportunity to unpack - and leverage - these systems to produce an architecture that animates public life. Our brief will speculate on how these places can be densified to include working & living spaces anchored by a public realm that supports both FoH & BoH function.
The studio will employ nontraditional methods of site analysis through found ephemera, layered and intertwined history, aesthetics, material culture, research and critique. The active archive will be a place to collect objects, surfaces, case studies allowing unexpected relationships to occur and influence our approach to practice. In Circles will seek new spatial opportunities through novel procedures of documenting, cutting, recording and reassembling.
We will search for a medium specific role for the moving image in architecture, and will teach you how to use a suite of tools including static/stop motion V-Ray collages as well as assemblages of found media constructed in Premiere Pro. Soundscapes & music will form a key part of these presentations - as we attempt to understand the spatial conveyances of a medium unrestricted by the frame.
These procedures will form the basis of a vocabulary of representational tools, geared towards the twinned presentation techniques of architecture school - the Panel (Active Archive) & Presentation (Short Film). Weeks 1-6 will be focussed on introducing and establishing these two modes of communication. Weeks 7-10 will involve high level discussion around key themes. We will visit the sites multiple times throughout the semester.
Tram Depot / Mixed Use
Tuesday 6pm
Rotating Pairs W1-5
Independent W5-14
BRUNSWICK TRAM DEPOT, VIEW FROM THE RAIL CORRIDOR - 2021
URBAN OUTFITTERS HQ - D.I.R.T. 2009
LUEVEN PERFORMING ARTS CENTRE SERGISON BATES 2019
SAFETY FLAG WITH FAKE CANDLE, JAR, AND FUNNEL
EBONY TRUSCOTT 2022
MATTER interrogates the production of architecture, both physically and ideologically.
We work at multiple scales, looking beyond the artifact of the building to the cultural, ecological and technological contexts that assemble our society. Provocations are grounded by interrogations of material histories, legacies and applications. Short, sharp design and research tasks allow each participant to build a repository of what MATTERS to them.
This studio is an opportunity to critique our current extractive and exploitative relationship to MATTER and propose alternate future directions for architecture. Students will develop material literacy and engage with the physical practice of architecture.
The specific research interests of each participant will be developed into a new public institution for testing, recording, archiving, discussing, teaching, exhibiting, probing and sharing knowledge associated with their chosen fields of inquiry. We are interested in architecture as both the container and generator of ideas.
GROUNDED COMMUNITIES
Studio Leaders
Steven Chu | architect
Srivarenya A | urban designer, architect*
Agenda
This studio builds on the position that design propositions need to be driven by a deep and grounded evidence-based understanding of the communities that they respond to, contribute to, and impact. The agenda of this studio is to engage with techniques that enable a designer to craft rigorous propositions that truly hold agency to affect change. The studio aspires to empower designers to create value through spatial design to address, investigate or perpetuate the instersectionalities within communities in the predominantly non-design world.
Time
Tuesdays
6pm to 10pm
RMIT Design Hub
Support
The studio is sensitive to neurodiversity and will adapt to the needs of the students
Project
Grounded Communities investigates multicultural cities through the lenses of the communities that inhabit them, to explore how architecture and urban design can affect social, cultural, and political change through evidence-based interventions across three scales – building, community, and urban.
Methodology
design methodology based on Plato’s Theory of Forms –Community – as the core tenet that the four fundamental tenets of Subject, Object, Brief and Site are built on. The literary design methodology will be interwoven with analogue and digital mapping of socio-political issues affecting communities to identify conceptual points of departure that will in turn be
*overseas registered
Master of Architecture Design Studio
RMIT School of Architecture and Urban Design
Sem 02 2024
will encourage a discursive and rigorous framework driven by intellect, analysis and narrative to form a collective, supportive, and interdependent studio culture that challenges ideological preconceptions and aspirational moorings that leave individuals and societies impotent to enact change. Studio sessions will be interactive, whereby students are expected to actively engage in studio discourse. Students will work in pairs on esquisses in the
in Melbourne individually in the form of a design intervention across the three scales of Building, Community, and Urban.
MONGREL MATERIALS
tutor | caitlyn parry
TUESDAY 9:30-13:30
We live as if we have an infinite amount of resources at our disposal. The 20th century saw an 23-fold increase in the use of natural resources in the construction industry alone. We have no lasting relationship to objects or the time and place they came from. We must reimagine the sole genius of the architect: We must build by reconfiguring, dissassembling and reimaging.
This studio will explore digital tools and techniques to provide the potential reuse of construction materials and to enable the communication of a relationship to the primary resources and individual architectural building parts. We’ll be looking at how we might develop a digital ledger or history for material and explore what forms kind of complex forms are possibly with pre existing elemental parts
These techniques are situated in the design of a Museum to the Architectural Element on the site of the Queen Victoria Market. We must build by reconfiguring, dissassembling and reimaging.
Important details
Group and collaborative work
Reclaimed materials site visit - $80 for transport, and guided visit.
Grasshopper will be used
BYO laptop
Customary Tenure will examine the varied and thoroughly contingent practices of land Tenure will examine the varied and of land use that are defined by local knowledges Moving away from the cadastral map, we will use that are defined local knowledges. away from the cadastral map, we will explore ways of occupying and building on land that escape the clutches of freehold ways of and on land that escape the clutches of freehold tenure. How are the spaces we inhabit shaped by the way we measure and demarcate tenure. How are the spaces we inhabit the way we measure and demarcate the world? How can the act of measurement be full of agency and activism? For each the world? How can the act of measurement be full of agency and activism? For each studio task, you will analyse one particular non-freehold model of occupation and studio task, you will analyse one non-freehold model of and economy You will also produce a measuring device - some mechanism by which land economy. You will also a device - some mechanism which land can be divided or organised, based on something other than simple metrics of distance can be divided or organised, based on something other than metrics of distance and area The collision of these two sources will define your architectural approach and area. The collision of these two sources will define your architectural throughout the semester, producing one project every two weeks - ramping up in the semester, producing one every two weeks - up in scale from very small to very large. Students will engage with the politics & culture of scale from very small to very Students will engage with the politics & culture of measurement - through a critical lens that understands that there is no true neutrality to measurement - a critical lens that understands that there is no true neutrality to the act of carving up the land. the act of carving up the land.
Working toward final presentations, you shall concoct a Zone Authority - as described toward final presentations, you shall concoct a Zone - as described by Keller Easterling - operating outside Australia’s laws of land use. Your Zones will Keller - outside Australia’s laws of land use. Your Zones will build upon your investigations throughout the semester, folding them into a continuous build upon your investigations throughout the semester, them into a continuous narrative of place narrative of place.
You will be working on a current contested development site with heritage value You will be on a current contested site with value.
The studio will serve to question the way we measure the Earth, and the way that current
The studio will serve to question the way we measure the Earth, and the way that current methods may be widened to make space for novel architecture methods may be widened to make space for novel architecture.
Customary Tenure
Flora and Fauna / Song / Sound / Ai - Art./ ClevermanAi - Word. Cleverman / The celestial / Time / Hierachy and ‘the deadly’/ Wattle and daub/ National/ Horizon and curiosity/ Narrative memory / + / +
NOTE: There will be road trip travel which will be over multiple nights at YOUR cost that will be clarified at ballot that will cover driving distances, food and accommodation costs.
NOTE: ‘Counter Errorism 4’ will attempt to immerse you. It will explore Indigenous knowledge and the external forces that impact our built environment. The brief will explore the intergenerational opportunities for a men’s healing centre that will host programs that foster engagement with place, and the narrative of place time experience as continuously occupied.
The studio will provide you with an opportunity to explore concepts that include; adjacency, totem, knowledge pedagogies, inclusion, articial intelligence (mythologically), decline, medicinal constructs and the potential of respite tourism. A major construct will be determining spatial hierglyphs in remote cultural identities
Background image: Sidney Nolan. ‘Riverbend’ 1966
NOTE: This will be the LAST Counter Errorism Studio
WHO: Simon Drysdale WHEN: 6pm + Tuesday evenings & occasional teams to compliment WHAT/WHERE: First Nations Healing Centre located on the banks of the Murray River near Mildura
Instrument Architecture MAS 2022 Masters Architecture Studio Supervisor Dr Peter Brew
Tuesday Morning 9.30
“Instruments are nothing but theories materialized” (Bachelard) .
The novelty of Raymound Queneau’s “book” 100 Million poems is in the way it reimagines the idea of a book, In a conventional book pages contain lines of text and are bound, Queneau book at first appearance accepts this format and is materially identical to a conventional book in all respects other than each line is a page and it is possible to encounter each line in a different order, in a new context within the book.
It is possible to recognise in the unconventional format of 100 million poems as an invention, it facilities or allows us to encounter the world differently, there is also a discovery which takes the form of a critique with respect to the nature of the book. it is possible to think of a book content as being regulated by its architecture. That the architecture is in this sense the possibility of the book, and what the architecture of Queneau’s book demonstrates is that this is not the only possibility.
The studio aims to look at the construction of ideas and the design of architecture. The ostensible content for our study’s high density residential projects though I am open to what final form might take.
THE MELBOURNE STUDIO
THIS STUDIO IS ABOUT THE PROBLEM OF THE PRECINCT.
For a city that prides itself in its status as a “Design City” and that touts the excellence of its architectural objects, Melbourne has proven strangely incapable of designing successfully at the scale of the precinct.
Urbanists are routinely unable to guide collective outcomes that deal with complexity, time and divergent expectations. The result has been poor precinct design outcomes - collection of un-reliant buildings that, beyond general indifference, have nothing to do with one another.
This studio is set on developing design thinking and design tools that can deliver an integrated urban outcome across multiple buildings. We’re interested in entanglement, in the ensemble and in entrepreneurism. We will examine Melbourne as it is and Melbourne as it might be. We will start by looking at the problems and urban consequences of the current Victorian Planning Provisions, which we might say see planning as a process of controlled conflict between the allotments of a city block. Speculating that the current provisions are inadequate, we will explore the consequences of a single counterfactual question: What if the boundaries that separate the individual allotments of the city block are erased? What other design tactics are available in a context where ownership of the city is shared among multiple stakeholders?
We will explore how an urban precinct might be formed around ideas of sharing, swapping, sacrifice, preservation, amplification and breaching. Important Melbourne designers and decision makers will engage with us and our work.
WHERE: 100.05.004A. WHEN: Wednesday Nights 6:00-10:00. STUDIO LEADER: Professor Mark Jacques.
RMIT Master of Architecture Design Studios
Studio Leader
Bios
RMIT Master of Architecture Design Studio Coordinators
Vicky Lam is an Associate Lecturer at RMIT Architetcure. She coordinates Selections and teaches Design in the Bachelors and Masters Programs.
Design Studio: Hong Kong Travelling Studio (BAS) e: vicky.lam@rmit.edu.au
Patrick Macasaet is Lecturer and PhD candidate at RMIT Architecture, Principal of Superscale Architecture and Research Lead at Immersive Futures Lab.
Design Studio: Matter Vibrant: Selfie Edition (BAS) w: superscale.com.au ig: @superscale ig: @rmitarchitecture e: patrick.macasaet@rmit. edu.au
RMIT Master of Architecture Program Manager
Dr Ben Milbourne is an architect and Senior Lecturer at RMIT where he is engaged in research on the creative potential and professional impacts of the adoption of advanced manufacturing in architecture. He is a founding partner of Common, an architecture and urban design practice focused on engaging in the common commission of the city through public and private projects.
Design Studio: w: www.common-adr.com ig: benmilbourne_ e: ben.milbourne@rmit.edu. au
Professor Alisa Andrasek is a Professor of Architecture at RMIT School of Architecture & Urban Design.
Design Studio: AI Accelerated Architect w: alisaandrasek.com w: www.aiarch.ai w: linktr.ee/nDarchitecture
Neil Appleton is a design Director of Lyons renowned for his expertise in sustainable urban design, collaborative work and learning environments, and recognised across Australia as a highly innovative architectural thinker.
Design Studio: Lyons Practice Studio: Free-Furb w: www.lyonsarch.com.au ig: @lyonsarchitecture
Charles Boman is a PhD Candidate in the RMIT Tectonic Formation Lab and a sessional lecturer at RMIT. He is currently working on the development of XL Glass Printing for 3D Printed Façade Systems at RMIT, with partners CSIRO and Maple Glass.
Design Studio: Facadism e: charles.joseph@rmit.edu.au
Professor N’arweet Carolyn Briggs AM is a descendant of the First Peoples of Melbourne, the Yaluk-ut Weelam clan of the Boon Wurrung. She is also the Founder and Chair of the Boon Wurrung Foundation, established to conduct cultural research, including for the restoration of the Boon Wurrung language.
Design Studio: Yalukit Weelam 2.0
Srivarenya Annaldasula is an Urban Designer and an overseas registered Architect. She is a Project Researcher at RMIT’s Supertight Architectural Urbanism Lab that tests unconventional solutions to the issues that cities face. As an Urban Designer she has collaborated with local councils and institutions while learning across disciplines through research.
Design Studio: Grounded Communities
Nic Bao is Senior Lecturer in Architecture at the RMIT School of Architecture and Urban Design and an adjunct Senior Researcher at the Centre for Innovative Structure and Materials (CISM) at RMIT University.
Design Studio: ReTectonics: Beijing Travelling Studio e: nic.bao@rmit.edu.au
Peter Brew is a Lecturer at RMIT Architecture in the School of Architecture & Urban Design, RMIT University, and a Director of Architect Brew Koch.
Design Studio: Instrument Architecture e: peter.brew@rmit.edu.au
Meagan Brooks (she/her) is an Architectural Graduate who is currently working at Wood Marsh. During her studies at RMIT, Meg was a three-time Design Excellence Award recipient and was awarded the Leon van Schaik Medal for her Major Project title ‘City Gifts’, 2022.
Design Studio: Cerulean Blue
Jimi Chakma is an urban designer, academic and overseas architect. His international expertise ranges from professional practice to academic teaching, with a focus on multiplicities in architecture and urbanism.
Design Studio: Tite Haus ig: @folio_jimi.chakma
Associate Professor Graham Crist is program director of the RMIT Master of Urban Design. He is a founding director of Antarctica Architects and an author of the publication Supertight.
Design Studio: Tite Haus ig: @antarctigram e: graham.crist@rmit.edu.au
Simon Drysdale is a specialist consultant offering strategic design and advisory services focused on cognitive decline - the psychology of space and how inclusive urban design and architecture can imporve quality of life experiences. Simon is a board member at Heathcote Dementia Alliance and a member at Dementia Alliance International Environmental Design Special Interest Group.
Design Studio: Counter Errorism 4
Briony Ewing is a Design Architect at Lyons and coleader of the Lyons Practice Studio who is passionate about design outcomes that are culturally expressive and contextually responsive.
Design Studio: Lyons Practice Studio: Free-Furb w: www.lyonsarch.com.au ig: @lyonsarchitecture
Steven Chu is an architect and educator who emerged from an upbringing within a brutal military dictatorship. He now holds the positions of Principal Architect and Director at Programmed, where he leads the design and delivery of projects instrumental to strengthening local communities for government clients across Victoria.
Design Studio: Grounded Communities
Lauren Crockett is an associate architect at Sibling Architecture. She co-founded independent architectural publication Caliper Journal in 2017 and continues to write, teach and practice within the architecture and design field.
Design Studio: Matter
Rodney Eggleston is Director of MARCH Studio.
Design Studio: MARCH Practice Studio w: march.studio ig: @march_studio
Yuchen Gao (they/them) is a spatial practitioner at Naomi Brennan Architects and Sibling Architecture, they are interested in the pluralist and interdisciplinary potential of design. Yuchen is the recipient of the Anne Butler Medal and Leon Van Schaik Medal, 2022.
Design Studio: Cerulean Blue
Lauren Garner is a registered architect and associate lecturer at RMIT, and co-founder of ExtraContextual. She has extensive experience in large civic projects through her work at Kerstin Thompson Architects, MCR, and Snohetta.
Design Studio: Coburg Iterations e: lauren.garner@rmit.edu.au
Greg Gong is a Director at Denton Corker Marshall (DCM) Architects in Australia.
Marc Gibson is Lecturer and PhD candidate in RMIT Architecture. Marc is the Digital Lead within the RMIT Architecture | Tectonic Formation Lab where his research contributes to the development of digital workflows and design strategies across advanced fabrication projects.
Design Studio: Chameleon ig: @marcwgibson ig: @tectonicformationlab e: marc.gibson@rmit.edu.au
Design Studio: ReTectonics: Beijing Travelling Studio
Caleb Lee (he/him) is a graduate of architecture working at Kerstin Thompson Architects. He has co-led design studios at RMIT and tutored at the University of Melbourne.
Design Studio: KTA Practice Studio: Housing Atlas w: kerstinthompson.com ig: @kerstin_thompson_ architects
Stasinos Mantzis is a practicing architect for 20 years. Stas is an experienced registered architect and educator with an interest in how culture and cultural knowledge can be integrated in all aspects of the built environment.
Design Studio: Yalukit Weelam 2.0 ig: @stasman
Professor Mark Jacques is an Urban Designer and Landscape Architect and director of Openwork, an office undertaking projects in public space, landscape architecture, urban design, research and speculation. Mark is Professor of Architecture (Urbanism) Industry Fellow within RMIT’s School of Architecture and Urban Design. Design Studio: The Melbourne Studio ig: @_openwork
Vicky Li is is an Associate at Lyons, interested in the role that empathetic design plays in enhancing the wellbeing and experience of building occupants, and all those who engage with it.
Design Studio: Lyons Practice Studio: Free-Furb w: www.lyonsarch.com.au ig: @lyonsarchitecture
Associate Professor Paul Minifie is a practicing architect, and long standing member of the RMIT Faculty. He is the director of MvS Architects.
Design Studio: Never Waste a Good Crisis ig: @mvsarchitects e: paul.minifie@rmit.edu.au
Tom Muratore is an architect, PhD Candidate, and Associate Lecturer in the School of Architecture & Urban Design.
Design Studio: Scrape and Anti-scrape e: tom.muratore@rmit.edu.au
Olivia O’donnell, is a registered Landscape Architect and founding member of Second Place, a collective opening dialogues around alternative and expanded modes of landscape architectural practice through conversations and collaborations with other disciplines, including art, architecture, industrial design and publishing.
Design Studio: Typical System
Steph Pahnis is a design architect, educator, and artist. Currently practicing at Lyons, she has made significant contributions to small, medium, and large-scale cultural, educational, and civic projects. Her academic experience extends multiple design studios and electives at RMIT University and the University of Melbourne.
Design Studio: Matter
Olivia Peel is an architect with experience working in practice, teaching, writing, and volunteering since 2015. Her interests are centered around architecture that is responsive to the Australian landscape and context, as well as hand-drawing as a critical design tool.
Design Studio: KTA Practice Studio: Housing Atlas w: kerstinthompson.com ig: @kerstin_thompson_ architects
Bryn Murrell is an architect working in practice, where he works on projects at every scale. He is also a part of HABIT, a public art studio that has provided works for the City of Melbourne and the University of Melbourne. He also teaches in the RMIT fashion program, educating on digital design and emerging technologies.
Design Studio: Customary Tenure
Liam Oxlade is a Senior Associate at NH Architecture and is interested in how ideas of civic function can be integrated into a diverse set of built & propositional outcomes.
Design Studio: Typical System ig: @lxlade
Caitlyn Parry is lecturer and PhD candidate in RMIT Architecture. They research material reuse, digital tools for archiving and reassembly and cultural meaning of construction materials. They are the Bachelors Communications stream leader, co-ordinate Communications 2 and the Digital Studio for the foundations program.
Design Studio: Mongrel Materials e: caitlyn.parry @rmit.edu.au
Dr Christine Phillips is a non-indigenous architect, educator and writer who is passionate about how history, culture and understandings of place and Country can inform our built environment.
Design Studio: Yalukit Weelam 2.0 w: www.oopla.org ig: @x10phillips e: christine.phillips@rmit.edu. au
Leo Showell is an architect and photographer with 12 years’ experience shaping and documenting the built environment. Practicing with KTA since 2019, his work focuses on contextually responsive public architecture, adaptive reuse and heritage intervention.
Design Studio: KTA Practice Studio: Housing Atlas w: kerstinthompson.com ig: @kerstin_thompson_ architects
Matt Stanley is an Associate at MARCH Studio.
Dr Michael Spooner is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Architecture & Design . He maintains a critical practice composed of teaching, writing, and speculative architectural projects.
Design Studio: Scrape and Anti-scrape e: michael.spooner@rmit.edu. au
Design Studio: MARCH Practice Studio w: march.studio ig: @march_studio
Vei Tan is Co-Founder of Superscale Architecture and Research Lead at Immersive Futures Lab. She has taught and coordinated courses at various universities to include Monash MADA, The University of Melbourne MSD and RMIT Architecture.
Design Studio: Vibrant Matter: Slow Vibes Edition ig: @superscale e: vei.tan@rmit.edu.au
Paul van Herk is an architect, urbanist and writer whose practice is led by incisive, humorous and speculative investigations into the myths, instruments and outcomes of urban development. Paul is a PhD by practice candidate at RMIT University, where he teaches design and history. He is a founding director of Extracontextual.
Design Studio: Peak Bureaucracy
Sophie Sung is an RMIT Architecture alumna, Researcher at Immersive Futures Lab and current RMIT+ACMI-X Fellow.
Design Studio: Vibrant Matter: Slow Vibes Edition e: sophie.sung@rmit.edu.au
Kerstin Thompson is the founding Principal of Kerstin Thompson Architects (KTA) established in Melbourne, 1994. She plays an active role promoting quality design within the profession and the wider community through talks, participation in government design review panels and as a regular juror on industry award panels.
Design Studio: KTA Practice Studio: Housing Atlas w: kerstinthompson.com ig: @kerstin_thompson_ architects
Dr Jan van Schaik is an artist and architect based in Melbourne. He is the director of MvS Architects, a researcher and PhD supervisor at RMIT Architecture & Urban Design, the founder and convener of the +Concepts creative practice presentation and performance series, the designer of the Lost Tablets art project, and founder and creative and cultural sector activist at Future Tense. Design Studio: Coburg Iterations ig: @mvsarchitects e: jan.vanschaik@rmit.edu.au
Barry Wark is an architect and designer based in New York whose studio works across the scale of sculpture, spatial installations, and buildings. His work is driven by a desire to give form and vision to architecture in the age of ecological awareness. He currently combines his practice with teaching and research at The Weitzman School of Design, University of Pennsylvania.
Design Studio: Weathering e: info@barrywark.com
Hannah Wilson is a UK-registered architect with 7 years experience practicing in Europe and Australia. Her interests lie in developing resourceful responses to challenging urban conditions, with a focus on the craft of construction and practical detailing.
Design Studio: KTA Practice Studio: Housing Atlas w: kerstinthompson.com ig: @kerstin_thompson_ architects
Hui Wang is a founding director of URBANUS Architecture and Design Inc, a research and design practice based in China. He holds an architect license in New York and is a RIBA Chartered Architect.
Design Studio: ReTectonics: Beijing Travelling Studio