The first five speakers for the 2016 National Architecture Conference have been revealed and includes a number of international experts.
Hosted by the Australian Institute of Architects (AIA), the conference will be themed ‘How Soon is Now’ and will explore the agency of architecture to make real changes in the world.
Five internationally-based experts have been unveiled in the first round of speaker announcements by event organisers for the 2016 conference to be held in Adelaide next April.
The first round of speakers (courtesy of the AIA):
Amica Dall of Assemble (UK)
Amica is a director and co-founder of Assemble, a collective who work across the fields of art, architecture, design and research. They began working together in 2010 and are comprised of 14 active members. Assemble’s working practice seeks to address the typical disconnection between the public and the process by which places are made. Assemble champion a working practice that is interdependent and collaborative, seeking to actively involve the public as both participant and collaborator in the on-going realisation of the work.
Julie Eizenberg of Koning Eizenberg Architecture (USA)
Julie Eizenberg brings design vision and leadership to California-based Koning Eizenberg Architecture. For over 30 years, the firm has been finding opportunities hiding in plain sight. Their approach to neighborhood, where most of Koning Eizenberg’s work lands, is based in observation, empathy, and an acceptance of messy urbanism. Rather than revelling in the clean slate, they delight in tinkering with conventions and expectations to make a reciprocal relationship with the social and physical context. Under Julie’s leadership, Koning Eizenberg has earned over 125 design and sustainability awards and been widely published.
Thomas Fisher of University of Minnesota the Metropolitan Design Centre at the College of Design (USA)
Thomas Fisher is a professor in the School of Architecture, the Dayton Hudson Chair in Urban Design at the University of Minnesota, and Director of the Metropolitan Design Center at the College of Design. He is a graduate of Cornell University in architecture and Case Western Reserve University in intellectual history. Named a top-25 design educator four times by Design Intelligence, he has also lectured widely at universities and in the professional and public sphere.
Sadie Morgan of dRRM Architects (UK)
Sadie Morgan is a co-founding director at the award-winning London-based dRMM Architects, renowned for creating innovative, high quality and socially useful architecture.Sadie was design director on the award-winning No.one Centaur Street, and her internal design expertise includes Dura, a radical reconfigurable modular design for an ‘Exemplar’ school of the future. She has headed up dRMM’s commercial work with a new office building for Aviva in the city and health and fitness centre for SkyBSB.
Nasrine Seraji of Atelier Seraji Architectes et Associés (France)
After studying at the Architectural Association and practising in London, Nasrine Seraji moved to Paris and, in 1989, established Atelier Seraji Architectes et Associés. Since then she has enriched her career with simultaneous engagement in practice, teaching and research. Nasrine has completed several notable buildings, including the award-winning Temporary American Centre in Paris, apartment buildings in Vienna, student housing in Paris and an extension to the School of Architecture in Lille.She has lectured and exhibited her work widely in Europe, North America, China and South East Asia.
