With two new labs:

AA Ground Lab explores invisible global networks and the spatial impact of policy making in the Global South through a transdisciplinary design approach.

AA Wood Lab focuses on the inherent properties of trees and wood as a building resources by integrating science, design and fabrication technologies in order to address our planet’s imminent environmental concerns.

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London, UK. The AA Residence is a cultural platform to research and develop new ideas and forms of practice at the intersection of architecture, art, technology, policy and design. Composed of a series of independent research groups that aim to produce and promote experimental work, each Lab includes an interdisciplinary cohort of fellows including architects, artists, policy makers, engineers, scientists and creative entrepreneurs. The AA Residence also works as an incubator with a shared workspace and professional development programme, giving architects and entrepreneurs the tools they need to build new practices and launch cultural projects that influence and contribute to the reimagination of the future.

On 19 November at the Silver Gala, the AA’s annual fundraiser, the school launched the first two AA Residence labs: AA Ground Lab and AA Wood Lab

Eva Franch i Gilabert, the AA School Director, said: ‘The AA Residence allows for new experimental forms of research to emerge at the intersection of academia and practice, opening up a new space for innovative ideas that can radically change the way we think, build and shape the future’.

Among the guests in attendance were Mike Davies, Jim Eyre, Thomas Heatherwick, Sam Jacob, Eva Jiricna, Indy Johar, Asif Khan, John Makepeace, Sadie Morgan, Nana Oforiatta-Ayim, Deyan Sudjic, Madelon Vriesendorp and Roger Zogolovitch.

AA Ground Lab

Directed by Jose Alfredo Ramirez and Clara Oloriz

Climate change is the biggest challenge facing humanity, and to address it requires a radical transformation of the design profession that focuses on a transdisciplinary approach. AA Ground Lab is a research design initiative that aims to investigate ways in which this transformation can take place by engaging with a diverse range of projects, scales and stakeholders in the Global South. Through collaborations with the Inter-American Development Bank, Latin American governments and research councils in the UK, Ground Lab is developing visualisation strategies, mappings and spatial understandings of socio-ecological systems. These will lead to proposal strategies that aim to achieve Latin American NDC (Nationally Determined Contributions), gradually reduce carbon emissions and decarbonise under social justice principles through design. AA Ground Lab visualises and politicises invisible global networks and the spatial impact of policy making, alongside the design of ground techniques that imagine alternatives to standard design practices.

Team: Jose Alfredo Ramirez, Clara Oloriz, Felipe Vera (IADB), Veronica Adler (IADB)

Research Fellows: Daniel Kiss, Rotem Lewisohn, Iulia Stefan

Collaborators: Yasmina Yehia, Elena Suastegui, Rafael Martinez

The Ground Lab is commissioned and funded by the Inter-American Development Bank.

AA Wood Lab

Directed by Zachary Mollica

Given imminent environmental concerns, trees are the source of an essential building material for the future. The AA Wood Lab will advance the role of our woodland campus in Hooke Park, Dorset, to educate architects in the sustainable use of forest produce to both build projects and drive new forms of research. Working with leading thinkers and practitioners, and collaborating closely with scientists, the Lab will develop a research programme beyond conventional architectural thinking. Integrating the latest science, design and fabrication technologies alongside traditional material knowledge, the Lab’s problem-solving approach will derive building strategies directly from wood’s inherent properties.

An open call for research fellows and Wood Lab team members will be made public in the coming months.

The Wood Lab has been made possible thanks to the generous support of John Makepeace – who as director of the Parnham Trust (1982–2001) founded the Hooke Park campus.

Support

For more information about the AA Residence or to support current and future Labs, please contact us at communications@aaschool.ac.uk

Members of the Press

If you would like to arrange an interview with the AA School Director, meet with the Lab directors or source press images please send an email to communications@aaschool.ac.uk