Past Events

Past Lectures & Events

Monday, September 11
Vanessa Keith
StudioTEKA

Monday, September 25
Kesha Franklin
Halden Interiors

Monday, October 9
The Fabric of Life: Textiles Across the Arts, Science, & Technology
Luca Cottini, Lucia Della Putta, Meriel Tulante, Kihong Ku, Marcia Weiss
Hybrid Event: Zoom Registration Available

Wednesday, October 11
Blurring Boundaries: Multidisciplinary Design for Food & Culture Experiences, Talk & Panel Discussion
In-Person at Think Company's Philadelphia Studio, 1315 Walnut St., 2nd Floor
2x4 Global Design Consultancy
LAB at Rockwell Group

Thursday, October 12
12 Noon, Virtual Lunchtime Lecture
Jefferson Institute of Smart and Healthy Cities Forum

Friday, October 13
12 Noon, Virtual Lunchtime Lecture
Jefferson Institute of Smart and Healthy Cities Forum

Monday, November 6
Future Cities Forum: AI in Urban Analytics and Design
Violet Whitney and Xiaojiang Li

Monday, November 13
Chinatown’s Community Activism: Past, Present, Future, Presentations & Panel Discussion
Andy Toy, PACDC and Mary Yee, Activist

Monday, February 5
Pedagogy for a Beloved Commons: Pursuing the Promise of Architecture
Dr. Sharon Egretta Sutton, FAIA
Distinguished Professor of Architecture
Parsons School of Design

Monday, February 12
The Landscape of Future History
David Rubin
Principal, DAVID RUBIN Land Collective

Monday, February 19
NOMAS Lecture
Cruz Garcia
Associate Professor
Iowa State University

Monday, February 26
Greening High-Density Cities
Jarron Lubin and Moshe Safdie
Safdie Architects

Monday, April 8
Urban History in Earth Time: Cities and the Anthropocene
Carl Nightingale
SUNY Buffalo

Thursday, April 18/19
4th International Neurodiversity & the Built Environment Symposium
Intentional Connections

Wednesday, April 24
Jefferson Institute for Smart & Healthy Cities
Low-Tech, High Performance Building Envelopes - Hot Climate
Virtual Panel Discussion

Charles L. DavisFall Lecture Series: Marion Weiss & Michael ManfrediFall Lecture Series: Antony WoodFall Lecture Series: Susannah DrakeGardens in the City: Round TableValerio Morabito's Exhibit Opening3rd International Neurodiversity & the Built Environment Symposium: PlaceMaking The event is co-organized by the Synesthetic Research and Design Lab, College of Architecture and the Built Environment at Thomas Jefferson University and the Center for Autism and Neurodiversity, Jefferson Health in Pennsylvania, as well as the Inclusive Design Research Centre of Ireland at UCD in partnership with SMARTlab teams in Dublin, Skelligs (West of Ireland) and Niagara (Eastern Canada).Suzanne Singletary & Suzanne Barucco4th International Smart and Healthy Cities Forum (Day 1)4th International Smart and Healthy Cities Forum (Day 2)Fall Lecture Series: Valerio MorabitoFall Lecture Series: Kathryn Ott Lovell

  • Design Justice: Power + Place Our values are validated through the spaces and places we design and subsequently build. Power + Place explores the privilege and power structures that have defined injustice in the built environment from America's inception. We will look at the history of the design justice movement and how the theory of practice continually advocates for the dismantling of power ecosystems that use architecture and design to create injustice throughout the built environment.
  • The Lessons of Modern Preservation Leo Marmol engaged the audience with his approach to the historic preservation of modern architecture, including the firm’s award-winning adaptive reuse and renovation of buildings by Richard Neutra, John Lautner, and Minoru Yamasaki. He discussed his approach to conservation as not merely the preservation of material but of the important issue of maintaining the integrity of the original design intent. Marmol also detailed the realities, challenges, and triumphs of Marmol-Radziner’s preservation work.
  • NOMAS Panel Discussion: Design Hurdles For the 4th Annual Jefferson NOMAS Spring Discussion Panel, our members have come up with the theme “Design Hurdles.” We want to have a conversation between the students, faculty, and our esteemed panelists about the unseen and uncomfortable topics that BIPOC and Minority members of the design discipline. Talking about these issues is a part of why NOMAS was founded and we are excited for this year’s discussion.
  • Design by Radical Indigenism Landscape designer and educator Julia Watson has conducted extensive research on indigenous ecological knowledges and innovations to reimagine technology towards a sustainable, climate-resilient design future. Her bestselling book, Lo-TEK: Design by Radical Indigenism, a global exploration of nature-based technology spanning 18 countries, has been featured in The New York Times, The Guardian, Architectural Digest, and more. Regularly teaching at Harvard and Columbia University, Watson’s studio work involves landscape and urban design, along with public speaking and consulting with brands on sustainability.
  • Building Brands: Corporations and Modern Architecture by Grace Ong Yan Grace Ong Yan discusses her new book, Building Brands: Corporations and Modern Architecture, which examines how clients, architects, and designers together crafted buildings to reflect the company’s brand, carefully considering consumers’ perception and their emotions towards the architecture and the messages they communicated.
  • Designing for Change Gina Ford and Rhiannon Sinclair of Agency LP discussed how design should be an agent of change in our society addressing social equity, cultural vitality, and environmental resilience in our current pandemic. They also presented their feminist-driven design practice and a number of interesting and exciting projects. Sinclair is an alumnus of the Landscape Architecture Program at Jefferson.
  • Transient Spaces Panel Discussion This panel discussion focuses on the themes presented in Transient Spaces book publication, a curated collection of essays and projects about the impact that mass migration is having on cities around the world. The book examines transience as a force of opportunity and resilience in the design of cities.
  • Grace Ong Yan: Building Brands Book Launch Grace is an architectural historian whose scholarship explores alternate theories of modernism, intersections of media and the built environment, and interdisciplinary collaborations.
  • 2020 Geodesign Forum: Geodesign + Urban Design Cities and suburbs alike face many challenges: providing sufficient housing across all income levels, changing retail landscapes, shifts in mobility, and now the uncertainty of a COVID-19 response and potentially long-term aftermath.
  • Neurodiveristy: Building Community & Rethinking the Built Environment The event aims to stimulate dialogue amongst designers, medical field experts and people with Autism Spectrum Disorder and their caregivers in regard to the inclusivity of our current environments and with particular focus on designing for neurodiverse individuals and those with ASD.
  • 2020 Jefferson Smart & Healthy Cities Forum Panel 1: Policy + Housing. Panel 2: How to Evolve Cities as Smart and Healthy Cities?
  • Kia Weatherspoon In this presentation, Kia will help the audience recognize the impact of labels, demographics and data on the design process. She will share her mission of Design Equity™, challenging professionals to approach projects with a focus on community and the collective human experience.
  • Alexander Eisenschmidt Alexander Eisenschmidt will introduce the topic of his recent book, The Good Metropolis, focusing on the productive tension between the city and architectural form.
  • 11th Street Bridge Park: Bridging Communities OMA+OLIN’s winning design for the 11th Street Bridge Park Competition connects two historically disparate sides of the Anacostia River with a series of rooms and active zones. The form of the bridge creates an iconic encounter, an “X” instantly recognizable as the river’s new image.
  • Jack Travis, FAIA Architect Jack Travis’ career of 40 years has evolved a triumvirate approach of educating students, practitioners and citizens nationally and internationally to the legacy of Blacks in architecture and the defining of a Black design aesthetic.
  • Joel Sanders / Sept. 12, 2020 / 4-Day Neurodiversity: Building Community and Rethinking the Built Environment Symposium
  • Hansel Bauman / Sept. 12, 2020 / 4-Day Neurodiversity: Building Community and Rethinking the Built Environment Symposium
  • Brian Sims / Oct. 12, 2020 / Brian Sims; Principal at Houseal-Levigne / GeoDesign Forum
  • Sara Jensen Carr / Oct. 19, 2020 / Sara Jensen Carr; Assistant Professor Architecture, Urbanism, and Landscape and Program Director, Master of Design in Sustainable Urban Environments in the School of Architecture at Northeastern University / “Embodied Environments”
  • Jessica Henson / Nov. 2, 2020 / Jessica Henson; OLIN
  • Transient Spaces Panel Discussion / Nov. 9, 2020 / Loukia Tsafoulia, Thomas Jefferson University; Sean Anderson, Museum of Modern Art; Suzan Wines, I-Beam Architecture and Design; Deen Sharp

  • Dr. Anat Geva Anat Geva, PhD, a registered architect in Israel and Associate Member of the AIA is a Professor of Architecture in Texas A&M University and a Fellow of the Center for Heritage Conservation.
  • Finding Design by Laurie D. Olin Laurie Olin is a distinguished teacher, author, and one of the most renowned landscape architects practicing today. From vision to realization, he has guided many of OLIN’s signature projects, which span the history of the studio from the Washington Monument Grounds in Washington, DC to Bryant Park in New York City.
  • Florian Meier Florian Meier is an Associate with Knippers Helbig – Advanced Engineering and is currently co-leading the New York Office.
  • John Ronan John Ronan FAIA is founding principal of John Ronan Architects in Chicago, founded in 1999. He serves as Lead Designer on all projects and is known for his abstract yet sensuous work which explores materiality and atmosphere.
  • Sustainability in the Age of Coronavirus: Flattening the Curve for a Sustainable Future Robert Fleming, AIA, LEED, AP, is the Co-creator and Director of the award-winning Master of Science in Sustainable Design Program at Thomas Jefferson University.
  • Thorsten Helbig Thorsten Helbig is Co-founder and Managing Partner at Knippers Helbig Advanced Engineering with more than 25 years of working experience
  • Tod Williams & Billie Tsien Their practice is committed to reflecting the values of non-profit, cultural and academic institutions toward an architecture of enduring vision. A sense of rootedness, light, texture, detail, and most of all, experience, are at the heart of what they design.
  • Transient Spaces Panel Discussion Mass migration is one of the most urgent issues confronting cities today.
  • Trevor Horst '08 Kieran Timberlake & Osborne Construction Philadelphia, PA
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