Against the backdrop of climate change, including an increase in guerrilla downpours and rising urban temperatures, there is a growing movement in the fields of urban design and architecture to seek forms of coexistence with ecosystems. We will invite Brian McGrath and Danai Thaitakoo to this event from New York and Thailand. They have been developing advanced approaches in ecology-based urban design. In addition to introducing their research and case studies, Atsuro Morita, an anthropologist at Osaka University, will join us to exchange views with you on the future of cities.Brian McGrath, Associate Director of the Tishman Center and Professor of Urban Design and former Dean of the School of Constructed Environments, Parsons School of Design.

As an architect, McGrath has dedicated himself to the relationship between urban design, the environment, and social justice. He served as the principal investigator for the Baltimore Ecosystem Study, one of the first research programs to study cities from an ecological perspective. His work has contributed significantly to reimagining cities as subjects of ecology and promoting architecture and urban design based on ecological principles.

Danai Thaitakoo, School of Architecture and Design (SoA+D), King Mongkut’s University of Technology Thonburi (KMUTT)

In the field of landscape design, Thaitakoo has conducted extensive research on the traditional waterfront urban landscape in Thailand and its transformation due to modernization. Based on anthropological and geographical studies of traditional Thai irrigation systems and water management, he has reinterpreted traditional Thai architecture and urban planning in relation to the environment. Together with McGrath, he proposes viewing contemporary Bangkok as a watershed system, through the lens of Waterscape Urbanism.

Wed, December 20, 2023  UTC+09:00

18:00 – 20:00