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Kathy Velikov & Geoffrey Thün

Infra Eco Logi Urbanism

Geoffrey Thün and Kathy Velikov are Associate Professors at the University of Michigan Tuabman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, and founding principals of the design-research practice RVTR. Their work and writing explores the agency of architecture and urban design within the context of dynamic ecological systems, infrastructures, energies, materially and technologically mediated environments, and emerging social organizations.

Their body of work in responsive envelopes” has been developing composite material systems that operate as thick, sensing skins that are integrated with sensing, intelligence, kinetic action, and interaction capabilities. 

This work has been published in Leonardo, IJAC, JAE, eVolo, [bracket] Goes Soft, and featured in in Hypernatural: Architecture’s New Relationship with Nature by Blaine Brownell and Marc Swackhamer, Paradigms in Computing by David Gerber and Mariana Ibanez, Performative Materials in Architecture by Rashida Ng and Sneha Patel, and High Performance Homes by Franca Trubiano. Most recently, their Infundibuliforms: Kinetic Tensile Surface Environments” project received a 2016 R+D Awards honorable mention from Architect Magazine. Thün and Velikov also undertake work at the urban scale of infrastructures and territories. They have recently co-authored Infra Eco Logi Urbanism (Park Books, 2015), and were collaborators on EXTRACTION, the Canadian Pavilion exhibition at the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale.

Kathy Velikov

Kathy Velikov is Professor and Associate Dean for Research and Creative Practice at the University of Michigan Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning. She is a licensed Architect and founding partner of the research-based practice rvtr, and the Vice President of ACADIA (Association for Computer Aided Design in Architecture).

Geoffrey Thün

Geoffrey Thün is professor of architecture at Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, and a founding partner in the research-based practice RVTR. Thün currently serves as Associate Vice President for Research: Social Sciences, Humanities, and the Arts at U-M’s OVPR where he works across a range of campus units and disciplines to catalyze new transdisciplinary research efforts oriented to address pressing societal, environmental and cultural challenges of our time.

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