Archive

Freya Spencer-Wood graduated from the faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment with a thesis on how the dialogue between politics and architecture can be made as open and accessible as possible. On 12 November, Spencer-Wood will give a live pitch to compete for the title ‘TU Delft Best Graduate 2019’, together with the seven nominees from other faculties.

Every year, the best gradation projects of the faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment are selected and exhibited at the BK Expo. The jury selected the nine best projects to compete in the Dutch Archiprix, the leading annual competition for upcoming design talent.

On 25 October, Monika Chao-Duives gives her farewell speech as Professor of Building Law. Within ‘The case of the melting dinosaur’, she will focus on the emergence of integrated types of contracts. But she will start by looking back at fifteen years as professor, making a final plea for basic knowledge of law to be made compulsory for every professional practitioner in the field of architecture and the built environment.

Living in a living fungus: as far as Bob Hendrikx is concerned, this should soon be possible. A life-size, tactile test setup of his graduation project will be on show during Dutch Design Week 2019.

The first cohort of MSc MADE students has graduated. With classes on metropolitan challenges, entrepreneurial skills and data analysis in the urban context, the graduates have developed to be the first generation of metropolitan innovators.

Mauro Overend has been appointed Professor of Structural Design & Mechanics at the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment. “Guaranteeing safety whilst using resources more efficiently, that’s the main objective.”

Within the research programme ‘Research on education innovation’, BK Bouwkunde structurally looks into opportunities to innovate, improve, monitor, and research education. The 4TU Centre for Engineering Education has granted € 105.000 to both BK Bouwkunde and the faculty Industrial Design Engineering to set up, carry out, and extend three projects and one event to further develop and share knowledge.

With Galileo, the new European Global Satellite Navigation System, cadastral measurements can be conducted real-time in the field. With the possibility for on-field boundary determination, conducting cadastral surveys becomes more efficient. Researchers received a H2020 grant to further improve the availability of the system and to integrate land surveys in the cadastral workflow.

Researchers of BK Bouwkunde contributed to the special issue ‘Facilitating Circular Economy in Urban Planning’ of the open access journal ‘Urban Planning’.

Student Ivneet Singh has been selected as one the finalists for the ‘ECHO Award Bèta techniek’. He has been working on a new way of producing glass to make complete transparent structures in large-scale public spaces. His dedication and approach to his complex and challenging graduation project resulted in his nomination.

Two Urbanism graduates have been selected to display their documentary ‘Northbound’ at the Architecture Film Festival Rotterdam 2019. The documentary about Europe’s most northern province Finnmark in Norway focusses on the pressure of incoming extractive industries in the Arctic on the landscape and local cultures.

The research project ‘Open-up interstices’ investigates the post-war neighbourhood Den Haag Zuidwest and has been granted funding by NWO Creative Industry KIEM. The project explores the value of existing open spaces of the neighbourhood and brings new perspectives for the undergoing urban regeneration plan.

The Double Face 2.0 research project has been selected as one of the best tech ideas of the Netherlands in 2019. The trombe wall with phase changing materials can ensure a much lower energy consumption of buildings. Science magazine KIJK organises the public contest, voting is possible until 1 October 2019.

Mortars are recurrently damaged and in need of frequent replacement due to salt crystallization. Mortars with mixed-in inhibitors can help mitigate salt damage. The new research project MORISAL investigates how these inhibitors can create a sustainable and cost-effective answer to a recurrent and severe problem met in practice.

This summer, a summer school on sustainable housing renovation was organised in collaboration with Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Queena Qian, Erwin Mlecnik, and Henk Visscher (MBE) introduced 32 Chinese students to a Dutch approach on a more sustainable development of new housing estates.

The project has been granted a € 500.000,- NWO Smart Culture Grant and seeks to develop an intersectional methodology to achieve more diverse and inclusive practices.

The layout of slums often appears to be chaotic, but there is usually one factor that brings an element of order: work. Architectural intervention is rarely successful if designers fail to take this into account, as PhD researcher Ana Rosa Chagas Cavalcanti discovered in the Brazilian favelas.

The second Jorma Vitkala Award of Merit was awarded to the professor of Architectural Glass for his contributions to the development of glass applications within the field of architecture.

Six articles on architecture and built environment design education have been published in the latest open access issue. Twenty staff members from all over the faculty contributed to broad range of topics.

The decreasing trend in the new-build supply of owner-occupied homes puts a continuously growing stamp on the dynamics and purchase price development of the existing housing stock. This hinders the possibilities of moving on from an existing owner-occupied home, which means that the supply of existing owner-occupied homes is also stagnating.

Architect Oliver Sack is fascinated by the question of how spatial design relates to the use of space as it is intended and experienced. For his PhD research, he explored the socio-spatial aesthetics of space formation in twentieth-century architecture.

On Sunday 28 July the TU Delft MOR team finished second at the 2019 Solar Decathlon Europe.

On 4 July, study association Stylos presented the ‘Teacher & Employee of the Year 2019’ Awards.

“It is about preparing them for the new reality of current and new urban challenges,” says Roberto Cavallo about the initiative encouraging students of Architecture, Urbanism and Building Sciences to participate in the nationwide design study, The City of the Future, a joint public-private project. “And in turn, the students inspire professionals and local authorities to think outside the box. This is essential when it comes to solutions for the major challenges facing cities nowadays.”

On 27 June 2019 the finalised collaboration agreement for the Building and Technology Innovation Centre (BTIC) was signed. The BTIC aims to achieve open collaboration by and for all parties in the design, construction and technology sectors, government bodies and clients, and with the knowledge and education institutions, in order to jointly realise integrated and supported multi-year knowledge and innovation programmes with impact.

BK alumnus Devant Asawla was awarded the shared first price at the Dutch Archiprix 2019 for his project ‘The living landscape of Quebrada Jaime’. Additionally, BK alumna Serah-Ingrid Calitz was given an honourable mention for her project ‘Sino-African counterpoints’.

How will growth and rapid changes affect Amsterdam on the time horizon of 2050? Graduate students, researchers and teachers from Architecture teamed up with AMS Institute and the municipality of Amsterdam to explore what possible future scenarios look like and how innovations can be introduced. The open access book ‘Amsterdam 2050’ with the results is now available on BK Books.

The leading role played by the wealthy citizens of the Dutch Republic is still visible to this day in the form of a green belt of country estates. They were developed alongside canals, strategic highways and trading routes by patrician families, PhD researcher Gerdy Verschuure-Stuip discovered. This is the origin of the country estates landscapes that still exist in and around Dutch cities.

On 3 July, professor of Urban Area Development Co Verdaas will give his inaugural address. “The question of how we structure and organise the Netherlands seems harder to answer than ever. This chair exists in order to help government bodies and market players to interpret the underlying complexity.”

The prototype for modular office renovation by the MOR Team TU Delft has officially been opened. The multi-functional apartment shows how inefficient offices can be renovated into net positive buildings, including space for food production, water purification through helophyte filters, and common living areas.

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has elevated Professor of Architectural Design Nathalie de Vries to its College of Fellows. This is in honour of her exceptional work and contributions to architecture and society on an international level.

Professor of Architectural Glass James O’Callaghan has been awarded the 2019 Institution of Structural Engineers Gold Medal. The Institution of Structural Engineers recognises his contribution to the exploration of the behaviour and limits of structural glass to create ambitious, transparent structures.

What influence does spatial design have on spatial planning at a regional scale level and on decision-making at all scale levels? Based on practical case studies from the Netherlands, PhD researcher Verena Balz explored the two-way traffic between regional design and the development of spatial policy.

The municipality of Delft and TU Delft will intensify their collaboration on urban area development. “The challenges in urban area development request a close collaboration to achieve breakthroughs faster,” explains professor Co Verdaas.

Collaborative production in cities has the potential to promote a more circular production paradigm, engage communities, and promote urban and community development. The research project Pop Machina aims to understand the spatial and social consequences of such circular collaborative production in urban areas.

The Ruralization project aims to develop knowledge and support policy making in answering rural area challenges.

The project Water4Change focusses on fit-for-purpose water sensitive design for fast growing liveable cities in India, combining know-how from Dutch and Indian experts.

Designing hospitals is a special niche within the architecture discipline. The Hospital Tour & Masterclass offers the opportunity to Chinese top architects from this niche to visit several hospitals in the Netherlands and Belgium.

Visiting Professor Marina Tabassum took students of the Global Housing design studio on a tour through Dhaka, exploring the social and spatial patterns of inhabitation in Dhaka. The design studio focuses on the theme ‘Dhaka: Housing the urban invisibles’, and will synthesise the student findings in a ‘Dhaka book of patterns’.

Nature-based solutions can be highly beneficial to coastal management and policy making, but is still underused due to a clear knowledge gap. The Sustainable and Resilient Coastal Cities (SARCC) project aims to bridge this gap. Researchers from BK Bouwkunde and the faculty of Civil Engineering & Geosciences received a € 480.000,- Interreg grant to create interdisciplinary innovations and implement the findings in seven case study locations.