British architect and planner Colin Fournier, co-founder of conceptual architecture studio Archigram and Professor of Architecture and Urbanism at the Bartlett School of Architecture, has passed away at the age of 79. Fournier was best known for his co-design of the Kunsthaus Graz in Austria, also known as the "Friendly Alien." This project, completed together with Sir Peter Cook, is celebrated as one of the most distinctive cultural landmarks of its time. For his contributions to this work, Fournier was awarded Austria's Goldener Ehrenzeichen medal in 2005, a recognition of his impact on the architectural landscape.
Bartlett School of Architecture: The Latest Architecture and News
Colin Fournier, Co-Founder of Archigram, Passes Away at 79
Top-Rated Universities for Studying Architecture in 2024, According to QS World Rankings
QS, Quacquarelli Symonds World University Rankings, has announced the annual list of the top universities to study Architecture and the Built Environment in the year 2024. The ranking evaluates over 1,500 institutions from over 100 locations. The evaluation system has been updated this year to include new metrics such as sustainability, employment outcomes, and international research networks.
The top three contenders, the Bartlett School of Architecture, MIT, and Delft UT, have maintained their ranking from 2023, with ETH Zurich showing a slight decrease from an equal third position to the fourth. In the sixth position, Harvard University stands out as the top university for employer reputation in this subject. Among the top 10 universities, Politecnico di Milano had the greatest advancement in rankings, moving from the 10th position last year to the 7th.
How the Black Females in Architecture Network is Changing Industry Standards
In early 2018, spatial practitioner and Bartlett lecturer Neba Sere hosted a panel discussion at London's Architecture Foundation, where she was one of six young trustees. The topic: beginnings. How to go about them, move ahead, and transform them into something that lasts. Six years later, she looks back on the event as a beginning in itself: that day marked the creation of a WhatsApp group that would turn into Black Females in Architecture (BFA). BFA is now a 500-strong global membership network co-directed by Sere and fellow architects Selasi Setufe and Akua Danso.
BFA was initiated in response to the need for visibility of black women and female-identifying people with black heritage in architecture and the built environment. Last year, the group celebrated its fifth anniversary with the showing of a short film and a panel discussion at the Venice Architecture Biennale. Now, after putting in the groundwork of spreading information about the lack of diversity and equality in the industry and increasing their numbers, BFA is gearing up to drive physical change.
Grimshaw Launches a Charitable Foundation Focused on Creative Education
The Grimshaw Foundation is a charitable organization aiming to bring access to creative learning tools to a diverse range of young people. The organization was established by Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, in partnership with the partners of international architecture practice Grimshaw. The central purpose is to bring together a globally linked educational community of artists, architects, and designers to support and empower young people. It hopes to reach them at the stage of navigating their career options and help them discover the varied options and opportunities that the creative industry can offer. The Foundation officially launched on 6 July 2022 at the Royal Academy of Arts in London.
Meet the List of Curators and Exhibitors at the Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism 2021
Under the theme of "Crossroads: Building the Resilient City", the 2021 Seoul Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism explores cities through architecture, design, and urban planning by highlighting "the virtues and dialogue of crossroads of knowledge" through exhibitions, installations, and events, that tackle the city of tomorrow led by architect Dominique Perrault. With more than 100 participating cities across five continents and installations by world renowned architects and designers, the Seoul Biennale will take place at various locations across the city from September 16 until October 31st, 2021.
The 2021 Architecture Film Festival London Gives a Platform to Multiple Curatorial Voices
The Architecture Film Festival London, now at its third edition, fosters conversations around architecture, society and the built environment through the medium of film. Along with the International Film Competition, the 2021 programme, debuting on June 2nd and held online, will feature a collection of diverse thematic screenings, essays and events titled "Capsules", which offer a platform to multiple curatorial voices.
Spotlight: Peter Cook
As one of the founding members of Archigram, the avant-garde neo-futurist architecture group of the 1960s, the British architect, professor, and writer Sir Peter Cook (born 22 October 1936) has been a pivotal figure within the global architectural world for over half a century; one of his most significant works from his time with Archigram, The Plug-In City, still invokes debates on technology and society, challenging standards of architectural discourse today.
The World's Top Universities for Studying Architecture in 2019
Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) has revealed it's ranking of the world’s top universities for the study of Architecture / Built Environment for 2019, based upon academic reputation, employer reputation and research impact.
On this edition, the Bartlett School of Architecture at UCL (University College London) has been named the best university for studying architecture, taking MIT's place, which has topped the rankings for the past four years .
Keep reading and check out the complete ranking.
Centre Pompidou hosts Living Sculptures investigating Life in a Digital Age
The renowned Centre Pompidou in Paris is to open its doors to two living sculptures, embodying the future forms of spatial intelligence. The exhibition, titled “La Fabrique du vivant” [The Fabric of the Living], will feature “H.O.R.T.U.S. XL Astaxanthin.g” by ecoLogicStudio in collaboration with Innsbruck University - Synthetic Landscape Lab, CREATE Group / WASP Hub Denmark - University of Southern Denmark, and "XenoDerma" by Urban Morphogenesis Lab directed by Claudia Pasquero at The Bartlett UCL.
Running from February 20th to April 15th, the exhibition will examine the notion of “living” in a digital era, where new interactions are emerging between the fields of life science, neuroscience, and synthetic biology. Permeating the entire urbanscape, this global, digital apparatus “encompasses miniaturization, distribution, and intelligence of manmade urban networks of in-human complexity, engendering evolving processes of synthetic life on Earth.”
The Top 200 Universities in the World for Architecture 2018
Global higher education analysis firm Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) has revealed its rankings of the world’s top universities for the study of Architecture / Built Environment for 2018. The eight edition of the survey compared 2,122 institutions across the globe offering courses in architecture or the built environment, narrowing down the list based on criteria including academic and employer reputation.
For the fourth straight year, MIT has topped the rankings, once again coming out ahead of the Bartlett School of Architecture and the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) in 2nd and 3rd respectively. Read on for the full rankings.
7 Alternative, Interdisciplinary Graduate Courses for Architects
As final juries draw to a close, graduating architecture students are left with a crucial decision to make. While some might take a plunge into the scary real world looking to gain professional experience, others might choose to further reinforce their architecture education and skill set. Of the latter, most enroll in an MArch program, or take well-trodden paths into urban design and planning, landscape architecture, historic preservation, or theory and criticism. But in an increasingly complex world faced with myriad problems, what about those graduate architects looking to bolster their education in other related disciplines that will give them a more unique perspective on design problems? Here, we shortlist seven alternative, interdisciplinary graduate programs offered by architecture schools worldwide.
"Faith Estates" Proposes a New Approach to Religious Pilgrimage by Excavating Holy Sites
In a time of what seems to be ever-increasing religious and political conflict, Bartlett students Akarachai Padlom, Eleftherios Sergios, and Nasser Alamadi instead chose to focus on collaboration between religions in their thesis project entitled “Faith Estates,” which outlines a new method of mass religious tourism. In an area around the Dead Sea characterized by disputed boundaries and conflicting ownership claims, the group aims to reimagine the relationship between the world’s three monotheistic religions, but also to rethink the relationship between religion, tourism, and the landscape. The design consists of large-scale excavation sites which form tourist resorts along a pilgrimage route with the goal of forming a mutually beneficial relationship.
The Top 200 Universities in the World for Architecture 2017
Global higher education analysis firm Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) has released in 2017 rankings of the world’s top universities for the study of Architecture & Built Environment. This year, for the seventh edition of the survey, QS has expanded the ranking to list the world’s top 200 schools, including institutions across all six inhabited continents.
For the third year in a row, MIT has topped the list, finishing ahead of the Bartlett School of Architecture and the Delft University of Technology (TU Delft). Read on for the full rankings.
80 at 80 Exhibition to Celebrate the Architectural Career of Sir Peter Cook
The Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL, is celebrating the opening of its new building at 22 Gordon Street with an exhibition of work by visionary architect Sir Peter Cook. Running from 23 February to 10 March 2017, the exhibition marks Sir Peter’s 80th year with a celebration of 80 of his inspired and pioneering projects.
Experience the "Brutal Faith" of Gottfried Böhm's Pilgrimage Church in Neviges
This exclusive photo essay by Laurian Ghinitoiu was originally commissioned for the fifth issue of LOBBY. Available later this month, the latest issue of the London-based magazine—published in cooperation with the Bartlett School of Architecture—examines the theme of Faith as "a fervent drive, a dangerous doctrine, a beautifully fragile yet enduring construct, an unapologetic excuse, a desperate call for attention and a timely consideration on architectural responsibility."
In 1986 the Pritzker Architecture Prize announced their first German laureate. In a speech at the ceremony in London’s Goldsmiths’ Hall, the Duke of Gloucester suggested that the prize “may not guarantee immorality,” inferring, perhaps, that not even the most prestigious award in architecture could compete with an œuvre so compact, focussed and enduring as that of Gottfried Böhm – a “son, grandson, husband, and father of architects.”