ARCHITECTURE ENGAGED Spring 2022

All events will be conducted via Zoom this semester and will begin at 6:00 PM Pacific Time, unless otherwise noted. Virtual events are free and open to the public.

BRANDI THOMPSON SUMMERS

UC Berkeley, Martin Luther King Lecture

Mon. 1/24, 6:00 PM PT

MLK Lecture Assistant Professor of Geography and Global Metropolitan Studies (GMS) at the University of California, Berkeley. She is co-founder and co-director of the Berkeley Lab for Speculative Urbanisms (BLSU). She is also affiliated with the Center for Science, Technology, Medicine & Society (CSTMS) and the Center for Race & Gender (CRG).

BEHNAZ FARAHI

Architect / Assistant Professor at the Department of Design, California State University, Long Beach

Mon. 1/31, 6:00 PM PT

Trained as an architect, Behnaz Farahi is an award winning designer and critical maker based in Los Angeles. She holds a PhD in Interdisciplinary Media Arts and Practice from USC School of Cinematic Arts. Currently she is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Design, California State University, Long Beach. She explores how to foster an empathetic relationship between the human body and the space around it using computational systems. Her work addresses critical issues such as feminism, emotion, perception and social interaction. Farahi has won several awards including the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum Digital Design Award, Innovation By Design Fast Company Award, World Technology Award. She is a co-editor of an issue of AD, ‘3D Printed Body Architecture’ (2017) and ‘Interactive Futures’ (forthcoming).

ALBERTO KALACH

TAX (Taller de Arquitectura X)

Mon. 2/7, 6:00 PM PT

Cited as one of the most versatile and prolific architectural voices in Mexico City today, Alberto Kalach works on residential projects, civic structures, and urban master plans. His award-winning José Vasconcelos Library in Mexico City remains the largest public library in Latin America. Kalach's concern for the emerging problems of his immense hometown has inspired projects on a variety of scales and solutions. At TAX (Taller de Arquitectura X), Kalach and his team are dedicated to transcending the inevitable geographic, economic and temporal constraints ingrained in each project to turn them into opportunities to build solutions that respect and celebrate the natural environment and its cultural context.

DÉBRA MESA MOLINA

Principal Architect of Ensamble Studio, Co-founder of WoHo

Mon. 3/21, 6:00 PM PT

Débora Mesa Molina designs and builds architectures that use overlooked materials and discover the beauty of the mundane. She is the principal architect of Ensamble Studio, a cross-functional team based in Madrid and Boston that she leads with her partner Antón García-Abril. Balancing imagination with reality, art and science, their work innovates typologies, technologies and methodologies to address issues as diverse as the construction of the landscape to the prefabrication of the house. From their early works -- such as SGAE Headquarters, Hemeroscopium House or The Truffle in Spain -- to their most recent works -- including the Cyclopean House and Structures of Landscape in the US -- every project navigates the uncertain aim of advancing their field. Through their startup WoHo, they are invested in increasing the quality of architecture while making it more affordable by integrating offsite technologies.

DEBORAH WEINTRAUB

City of Los Angeles Bureau of Engineering

Mon. 4/4, 6:00 PM PT

Deborah is the City of Los Angeles’ highest-ranking architect and the Chief Deputy City Engineer. For 21 years she has provided critical design and delivery direction for a range of City projects, including new and refurbished parks, pools, and public libraries; master planning of major public open spaces; police and fire facilities; theaters and art centers; maintenance yards and asphalt plants; new and refurbished bridges; major street reconfigurations; and historic landmark restorations. In addition to leading the effort to pass the City’s first green building policy for public facilities, she directed the City’s Los Angeles River master planning efforts, which received a 2009 AIA National Honor Award for Regional and Urban Planning, and is spearheading ongoing River projects across the City. In 2016, she was honored with the Julia Morgan Icon Award from the LA Design Festival, and in 2019 she received the AIA/LA’s inaugural Citizen Architect award. She graduated with honors from both Princeton University and UC Berkeley, from which she received her Masters of Architecture.