FABRICATE 2017 is hosted by Achim Menges, Professor and Director of the Institute for Computational Design and Construction at University of Stuttgart, in collaboration with Bob Sheil, Director of the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London.
Achim Menges, born 1975, is a registered architect and professor at the University of Stuttgart, where he is the founding director of the Institute for Computational Design and Construction (since 2008). He also is Visiting Professor in Architecture at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design since 2009. He graduated with honors from the AA School of Architecture in London where he subsequently taught as Studio Master of the Emergent Technologies and Design Graduate Program from 2002 to 2009, as Visiting Professor from 2009 to 2012 and as Unit Master of Diploma Unit 4 from 2003 to 2006. From 2005 to 2008 he was Professor for Form Generation and Materialisation at the HfG Offenbach University for Art and Design in Germany. In addition, he has held visiting professorships in Europe and the United States.
Achim Menges practice and research focuses on the development of integral design processes at the intersection of morphogenetic design computation, biomimetic engineering and computer aided manufacturing that enables a highly articulated, performative built environment. His work is based on an interdisciplinary approach in collaboration with structural engineers, computer scientists, material scientists and biologists. Achim Menges has published several books on this work and related fields of design research, and he is the author/coauthor of numerous articles and scientific papers. His projects and design research has received many international awards, has been published and exhibited worldwide, and form parts of several renowned museum collections, among others, the permanent collection of the Centre Pompidou in Paris.
Achim Menges is a member of several international research evaluation boards and a member of numerous scientific committees of leading peer-reviewed international journals and conferences.
Bob Sheil, born 1965, is a registered Architect, Director of The Bartlett School of Architecture, and Professor in Architecture and Design through Production. He is a founding partner of sixteen*(makers), whose work in collaboration with Stahlbogen GmbH ‘55/02’ won a RIBA award for design in 2010, and also includes a ten year catalogue of experimental projects both internationally published and exhibited. He is an educator, critic, researcher, collaborator and practitioner, as well as an experimental designer who is fascinated by transgression between making, craft, and technology, in architectural design practice. He has played a leading role in the Schools significant acceleration of investment in digital technologies since he took over as Director of Technology in 2007, including founding the Digital Manufacturing Centre (2009) and later evolving it into the Bartlett Manufacturing and Design Exchange (B-MADE), which merges all workshop and laboratory resources of the School under one organization.
He is the author of multiple book chapters, refereed papers, and articles on design, making and technology. He has co-designed and built 6 significant artefacts/built works, and been internationally exhibited on 11 occasions. He has edited five books, including three issues of Architectural Design; ‘Design through Making’ (2005), ‘Protoarchitecture’ (2008), and the forthcoming ‘High Definition: Negotiating Zero Tolerance’ (2014), an AD Reader ‘Manufacturing the Bespoke’ published in 2012, and ‘55/02: A sixteen*(makers) Monograph’ (also 2012). In 2011, he Co-Chaired the highly acclaimed international conference ‘FABRICATE’ with Ruairi Glynn, for which he also co-edited the substantial parallel publication. FABRICATE has now become an internationally established conference brand, with the 2014 event hosted by ETH Zurich. A number of his lectures on design and making can be viewed online including his inaugural lecture “Design through Production” which has registered 2000 plays. He is currently developing new strand of collaborative research between making, performance and 3D scanning, in collaboration with the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, SHUNT, and ScanLAB projects.
