Current changes in conditions and contexts for architectural research and practice: A brief introduction

Book chapter, 2019

The discipline of architecture is currently undergoing a significant change as professional practice and academia seem to be transforming one another specifically through succinct research undertakings. This book continues the discussion started in The Changing Shape of Practice – Integrating Research and Design in Architecture on architectural offices’ modes of research and lines of inquiry in architecture and how it reshapes practice. The book aims to contribute to the mapping and discussion on research in architectural practice and its transformational impact and gives input to the discussions on where the architectural profession is heading.

In this second volume, various research initiatives and modes in architectural practices are portrayed. The book also includes contributions that broaden the scope and put the developments into larger contexts, and present an overview of developments from different regional perspectives and of various social aspects of architecture. It also relates the developments in practice to educational efforts and to initiatives where the more traditional role of architects is challenged.

The contributions include chapters by Walter Unterrainer, Anthony Burke, Renée Cheng and Andrea J. Johnson, and Michael U. Hensel, and on the practices atelier d’architecture autogérée, Helen & Hard, MVRDV and The Why Factory, NADAAA & Nader Tehrani, Nordic – Office of Architecture, Schmidt Hammer Lassen, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, Void, Sarah Wigglesworth Architects, and Älvstranden Utveckling.