Bond University Architecture Lecture Series

The unique landscape of the Gold Coast is set to be a topic of discussion at the first event of the Bond University Architecture Lecture Series for 2016, with a seminar that brings together notable landscape architects from across Australia and internationally to examine the relationship between landscape and built environment.

Titled “Catalysts, Connections and Interventions,” the event will feature a broad range of approaches to understanding and working with landscape, with international guest speakers Sofie Willems and Joan Maria Raun Nielsen, principal landscape architects at Spektrum Arkitekter in Copenhagen, Denmark, to discuss citizen engagement and activation in design work.
The seminar will take place at Bond University’s award-winning Abedian School of Architecture building on Feb. 19 and is free to members of the general public to attend.
It will launch the Bond University Lecture Series for 2016, a free regular event hosted by practitioners and academics helping to expand and explore the definition of architectural practice and its role in creating the contemporary built environment.
Kevin O’Brien, Principal Architect of Kevin O’Brien Architects (KOA), will open the Catalysts, Connections and Interventions seminar with a discussion into ritualised landscape as an origin for architecture, followed by Gerard McCormick, Principal Landscape Architect for Cardno, who will discuss how the use of open space on the Gold Coast makes the area unique.
The theme of landscape architecture as a catalyst for change, will be discussed by Professor Sue Anne Ware, Landscape Architect and Head of School of Architecture and Built Environment at University of Newcastle.
The event will be further complemented by Dan Plummer and Belinda Smith of Plummer and Smith and locally based Danish landscape architect Marianne Kristensen Carter, who will discuss their approach to landscape design and the work of their respective practices.
Professor Adrian Carter, Head of Architecture at Bond University, said he encouraged anyone with a keen interest in the relationship between the built and natural environment to come along to the first lecture of the series on Feb. 19.
“We are thrilled to be hosting such an impressive group of landscape architects and architects for the first seminar of the Architecture Lecture Series for 2016,” he said.
“Landscape informs and defines our sense of being and identity, both individually and collectively. Our appreciation of landscape and the interventions that we make within it connects us to the natural environment, binds together our built environment and sets the stage for the narratives that define our culture.
“We are very fortunate to be able to welcome our Danish guest speakers Sofie Willems and Joan Maria Raun Nielsen from Spektrum Arkitekter in Copenhagen, whose work linking urban planning, the built environment and landscape design has gained much recognition.”
Presenting as part of the successful lecture series later this year will be Richard Hassell of Singapore-based architecture practice WOHA at the Asia Pacific Architecture Symposium in Brisbane and Jimenez Lai of Los Angeles firm Bureau Spectacular.
Professor Carter said the Architecture Lecture Series had grown exponentially since its beginnings in 2013, with an outstanding line-up of world-renowned architects set to take the stage in 2016.
“We are particularly excited to announce that Jimenez Lai of Bureau Spectacular in Los Angeles will be taking part in this year’s series. His work has been widely acclaimed and is displayed at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York and will be a centrepiece at this year’s Coachella Music and Arts Festival in California,” he said.
“Mr Lai’s provocative and colourful, non-conformist approach to architecture has garnered much attention, and his presentation in September will certainly be very visually fascinating and thought provoking.”