Yale School of Architecture Public Lecture Series

Occasioned by opening of the Yale School of Architecture Gallery exhibition, “Massimo Scolari: The Representation of Architecture” (6 February – 4 May 2012), Professor Scolari offers a retrospective of his career with special emphasis on personal inspiration(s) and the art of drawing.

Delivering the Yale School of Architecture’s annual Timothy Egan Lenahan Memorial lecture, Charles Waldheim (John E. Irving Professor of Landscape Architecture and Chair of the Department of Landscape Architecture at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design) discusses how 21st century urban planners are challenged by the need to organize not just people but space itself and hence defines a new architectural discourse: landscape urbanism.

Delivering the Yale School of Architecture’s annual Eero Saarinen lecture, Edward Glaeser (Fred and Eleanor Glimp Professor of Economics at Harvard and Director of the Taubman Center for State and Local Government) discusses how “cities magnify humanity’s strengths” by spurring innovation, facilitating face-to-face interaction, attracting talent, encouraging entrepreneurship, and allowing for social and economic mobility.

Delivering the Yale School of Architecture’s annual Gordon H. Smith lecture, William Baker, PE, SE, FASCE, FIStructE (Structural and Civil Engineering Partner, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill) provides an analysis of the world’s tallest building, Burj Khalifa (located in downtown Dubai) and the close collaboration between the architects and engineers that led to its final design.

Occasioned by the opening of the Yale School of Architecture exhibtion, “Gwathmey Siegel: Inspiration & Transformation”, Kenneth Frampton, (Ware Professor of Architecture, Graduate School of Architecture , Planning and Preservation at Columbia University) lectures on the architecture, innovation, process, and legacy of this acclaimed firm.

Freedomland is the latest in a long line of visionary plans for American living. It is an experiment in reconciling the seemingly incompatible needs and desires that define our current economic, environmental, and, most importantly, political climate. Its logic is one of both/and: both Jefferson and Hamilton (founding fathers of our collective split personality); both open and closed; both centralized and decentralized; both individualistic and collectivist; both farm and market; both local and global; both village and villa, and, ultimately, both city and country.

Visionary social thinker Joel Kotkin looks ahead to America in 2050, revealing how the addition of one hundred million Americans by mid-century will transform how we all live, work, and prosper.

Since 2008, more than half the world’s population now lives in cities. For Shelley McNamara and Yvonne Farrell, co-founders of Grafton Architects, “what we build as Architects constructs the world we live in. It defines our world. It is the outer crust of the globe. Architecture is the expression and embodiment of Culture. What we build as Architects is in fact the New Geography.”

Occasioned by the Yale School of Architecture Gallery exhibition, “Ceci n’est pas une reverie: The Architecture of Stanley Tigerman” (curated by Professor Petit) and the gift of the Tigerman archive to Yale University, Professor Petit reviews the work, influence and legacy of Mr. Tigerman (‘60, Arch ‘61).

Professors Coward, Froud, Lacovara and Shearcroft are founders and principals of AOC (Agents of Change) - a practice of architects, urbanists and interpreters, established in 2003. Building on experience gained at respected practices and regeneration bodies in London and abroad, the AOC’s architecture is both robustly pragmatic and beautifully imaginative embracing challenging projects and encourage clients to be demanding, generating open, honest, generous proposals in response.

The Edward P. Bass Fellowship enables the Yale School of Architecture to pair a leading developer with resident or visiting faculty, offering an advanced studio and makes possible within the School the kind of interchange between sophisticated architects and sophisticated market-based clients that characterizes much of the work being done in the field today. The Durst Organization, recognized as a world leader in the development of high-performance and environmentally advanced commercial property, was founded in 1915 and is the owner, manager and builder of 13 million square feet of residential property. A third generation of his family to lead the Durst Organization, Douglas Durst assumed the role of president in 1992, a position he held until 2010 when he became the company's chairman.

Mr. Tigerman’s lecture is occasioned by the opening of the exhibition “Ceci n’est pas une reverie: The Architecture of Stanley Tigerman”, which opened at the Yale School of Architecture Gallery on 23 August 2011. Stanley Tigerman’s buildings writings and drawings are indispensable reference points for our understanding of Modern architecture. They have helped move architecture towards a broader range of ideas associated with memory, irony, humor and wit.

A lecture delivered by Yale School of Architecture Eero Saarinen Visiting Professor Brigitte Shim, in which Professor Shim reviews the work of her Toronto-based firm, Shim-Sutcliffe, with particular emphasis on recent projects around the Great Lakes.

A lecture detailing Professor Petit’s work constructing the Yale School of Architecture exhibition, “An Architect’s Legacy: James Stirling’s Students at Yale, 1959-1983” (13 October 2010 – 28 January 2011).

This lecture was a surveys recent work the firm, Tod Williams/Billie Tsien Architecture including the new Barnes Foundation in Philadelphia, PA; the Center for the Advancement of Public Action at Bennington College, VT; Tata Consultancy Services campus at Banyan Park, India; Savidge Library at the MacDowell Colony; Andlinger Center for Energy and the Environment at Princeton University, NJ. The lecture draws connections between the projects, focusing on the theme of lasting - represented in a palette of durable materials and the care with which institutional clients are building for the future. Also evident in the work is a shared interest in using landscape to enrich the experience of place and sculptural responses to bringing natural light into the enclosures.

Hernan Diaz-Alonso, considered one of the most significant voices of his generation, is the principal and founder of Xefirotech, an award-winning firm in architecture, product design and digital motion in Los Angeles. This lecture will focus on past and current projects.

A discussion between Yale School of Architecture Charles Gwathmey Professor in Practice Peter Eisenman and Dean of the Cooper Union Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture Anthony Vidler, in which they discuss the work and influence of the Pritzker Prize winning architect and former Yale professor, James Stirling.