Interview with Jan Knippers: On the difference between architects and engineers: "There are two basic things that architects should know about engineers. The first is that all engineers, not only structural but also mechanical, aerospace engineers, are trained in model thinking.  That is why in every book that you find on engineering, even my own book, there is a table which gives a pool of options for building structures which are subdivided according to the complexity of geometry, basic load bearing systems, and so on.  What engineers basically do is they look at these tables and they choose options that meet the challenges and are appropriate to the problem.  This pool of options is influenced by history and experience but it always follows a given role model, so this means that on a conceptual level, innovation is not very high.  The second thing is that for an engineer, a good design means optimization of efficiency.   Since my first day of university I was trained that a good structure is one that uses the least amount of material and that is as light as possible. We learn that basically, these are the only criteria that matter.  And it is not always true." He likes working with lesser known offices sometimes: "It often happens—even in magazines like Mark--- that engineers are thought of as being “good” because they work with famous architects.  Like, this office is good because they work with Zaha Hadid so we should be interested in them.  But for us, it is sometimes the case that it is even better to work with lesser known architects and offices because you can often get more options, we can explore ideas and bring our own input.    For example the Peek and Cloppenburg project, in the architectural design by Renzo Piano project it was clear that the entire geometry was completely defined before we began. Also this idea of how the lamellas were designed, not how they were fixed but how they were to look, this was already decided.   Sometimes when you work with famous architects, it is important for your portfolio, but there are ways to do interesting engineering projects with all kinds of offices."  Read more in Mark Magazine April/ May 2012. 

Ecological Design Research and Computation Symposium
April 30 2012, 10.00-5.30,   Architectural Association, London,  Main Lecture Hall
In conjunction with the AA School's Masters Programme in Sustainable Environmental Design, the Symposium brings together eight contributors to Architectural Design's special issue "Experimental Green Strategies – Redefining Ecological Design Research", edited by Terri Peters and published by John Wiley and Sons 2011.

Symposium Speakers:  
Simos Yannas, AA Graduate School: Adaptive Strategies for an Ecological Architecture,  Robert Aish, Autodesk Research: Designing at t+n,  Azam Khan, Autodesk Research: Simulation and the Future of Design Tools for Ecological Research, Kasper Jørgensen, 3XN Architects, Denmark: Architect as Material Designer,  Judit Kimpian and Christian Derix, AEDAS: Research and Design Computation, Meredith Davey, Atelier 10: Ecologically Reflective Design,  Irene Gallou and Giovanni Betti, Foster+Partners: Project-led Research, Terri Peters, AD Guest Editor: Experimental Green Strategies, Redefining Ecological Design Research

Upgrade Research Day April 26 2012, 10.00-16.00,   Aarhus Architecture School, Denmark
Aiming to build a "bridge" between academia and practice, the Upgrade 2012 Research day invites six PhD students in Denmark to present their work and have discussions with invited guests and audience members. During the day and also during the Professional Conference Day on Friday 27th April, an exhibition of Posters of Research work will be on show, with a dozen researchers showing the state of sustainable transformation research in Denmark.  The Research Day will be held in English, and the Conference in both Danish and English.
For more information visit Upgrade 2012 which has details of the Research Day (thursday April 26), Conference Day (friday April 27) and Site Visits (Saturday April 28). 

SmartGeometry is an international community of academics and professionals who hold annual workshops and conference days at academic institutions around the world. Now in its ninth year, this year´s theme was Material Intensities and both the four-day workshop and conference day was held at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center in Troy, New York. Sponsored by software company Bentley, the next event will be held in London in 2013. Previous Archinect features reported on SmartGeometry 2009 in San Francisco and SmartGeometry 2011 in Copenhagen.  This year, there were ten workshop groups and about 100 participants in the ten research “clusters”. Each cluster presented a challenge to its participants relating to an idea about materials, with the aim to develop digital tools and physical prototypes during the workshop. Rather than a traditional teacher-student workshop dynamic, the SmartGeometry groups are arranged as collaborations between multi-disciplinary designers based on their interests and expertise. Read more here.

MIPIM is the world´s premier real estate event for professionals.  Launched in 1990, MIPIM is the most global real estate event dedicated to professionals from all regions and sectors.  In 2012, more than 19,000 attendees from 90 countries came to the four day event held at Palais des Festivals, Cannes, France.   The  Keynote Addresses by Architects on "Building Innovation" was held on 8th March 2012,  co-organized by MIPIM and Lord Culture. 

Presenters 
Terri Peters, Moderator of the Session, Researcher and Guest-editor of Architectural Design,  Kim Herforth Nielsen, Founder and Principal 3XN, Denmark,  MA Yansong, Founding Principal, MAD Architects, China, Tobias Nolte, Director Gehry Technologies, Europe, Thomas Willemeit, Graft, Germany.