IAAC MRAC Scholarship Challenge 2021

Areti Markopoulou is a Greek architect, researcher and urban technologist working at the intersection between architecture and digital technologies. She is the Academic Director at IAAC in Barcelona, where she also leads the Advanced Architecture Group, a multidisciplinary research group exploring how design and science can positively impact and transform the present and future of our built spaces, the way we live and interact. Her research and practice focus on redefining the architecture of cities through an ecological and technological spectrum combining design with biotechnologies, new materials, digital fabrication and big data.

Areti is co-founder of the art/tech gallery StudioP52 and co-editor of Urban Next, a global network focused on rethinking architecture through the contemporary urban milieu. She is the project coordinator of a number of European Research funded Projects on topics including urban regeneration, circular design and construction and multidisciplinary educational models in the digital age.

Areti is the founder and is currently chairing the Responsive Cities International Symposium in Barcelona while she has served as Head Curator of international exhibitions such as Future Arena and On Site Robotics (Building Barcelona Construmat 2017-19), Print Matter (In3dustry 2016), HyperCity (Shenzhen Bi-city Biennale, 2015) and MyVeryOwnCity (World Bank, BR Barcelona, 2011). Her work has been featured in exhibitions worldwide and together with Lydia Kallipoliti she has been appointed the Head Curator for the Tallinn Architecture Biennale 2022.

Mathilde Marengo is an Australian – French – Italian Architect, with a PhD in Urbanism, whose research focuses on the Contemporary Urban Phenomenon, its integration with technology, and its implications on the future of our planet. Within today’s critical environmental, social and economic framework, she investigates the responsibility of designers in answering these challenges through circular and metabolic design.

She is Head of Studies, Faculty and PhD Supervisor at the Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia’s Advanced Architecture Group (AAG), an interdisciplinary research group investigating emerging technologies of information, interaction and manufacturing for the design and transformation of the cities, buildings and public spaces. Within this context, Mathilde researches, designs and experiments with innovative educational formats based on holistic, multi-disciplinary and multi-scalar design approaches, oriented towards materialization, within the AAG agenda of redefining the paradigm of design education in the Information and Experience Age.

Her investigation is also actuated through her role in several National and EU funded research projects, among these Innochain, Knowledge Alliance for Advanced Urbanism, BUILD Solutions, Active Public Space, Creative Food Cycles, and more. Her work has been published internationally, as well as exhibited, among others: Venice Biennale, Shenzhen Bi-City Biennale, Beijing Design Week, MAXXI Rome.

Aldo is an architect, researcher, expert
in computational design and digital
fabrication. Master in Architectonic
Design in 2007, Master in Advanced
Architecture at IAAC in 2012, Fab
Academy diploma in 2014 at Fab Lab
Barcelona, Aldo is currently involved
in several projects running in parallel.
Since 2011, he is founder and manager
of Noumena, data-driven design firm,
investigating between the boundaries
of new digital paradigms and design
strategies applied to architecture,
robotics and fabrication. Aldo is founder
of Fab Lab Frosinone and director of
Reshape, a digital platform promoting
interdisciplinary and collaborative
approach in the field of wearable tech
and fashion design. Since 2015 he is
faculty at IAAC, leading as director
the IAAC Global Summer School, as
co-director the Master of Robotics
and Advanced Construction, and
as instructor of digital tools. Aldo
represents one of the Supernode of
Fab Academy, educational platform
founded by Neil Gershenfeld from the
MIT’s Center of Bits and Atoms. For the
same program, he is also coordinating
the Fab Academy Paris.

Alexandre is an architect and
researcher combining new technologies
in an attempt to improve how we
build and live in our cities. He holds
a Master degree of Architecture &
Engineering from EAVT & ENPC (France)
and a Master Degree of Architecture
from IAAC, with a specialization in
robotic fabrication and large scale
additive manufacturing (FabBot 3.0).
Alexandre holds as well a French
architectural licence (HMONP) and
worked in several architectural offices,
from competition stage to delivery
(Libeskind, Atenastudio, iDonati,
AREP) while exploring the potential
of scripting and coding in a separate
practice (Collectif277). Since 2012, he is
working at IAAC as expert in digital and
robotic fabrication. Alexandre is now
leading the Open Thesis Fabrication
program as well as the Master in
Robotic and Advanced Construction
at IAAC. Together with IAAC staff,
students and industrial partners, he
is investigating how new advances
in material, digital fabrication and
computational design could lead to a
better construction ecosystem, toward
a more efficient, affordable, sustainable
and personalized built environment.