GSD Winter Events around the Globe
The year has been off to a vibrant start for our community bringing together alumni, friends, and distinguished speakers for stimulating conversation and thought-provoking discourse. Over 400 GSD alumni and friends from around the world connected with colleagues and the GSD during ten events in Berkeley, Jakarta, London, Los Angeles, Mexico City, Taipei, and Cambridge. Plus Alumni Council Members hosted local Ambassador Events: Jim Wilson MArch ’93 hosted an event at the Conduit Gallery in Dallas and Nancy Cheng MArch ’90 organized a tour of a co-operatively-governed community in Portland, Oregon. Below are just a few of the event highlights.
Cambridge: Get Hired! (No Promises) Panel and Reception Connects Students and Alumni
On Tuesday, January 26, over 100 GSD students and recent graduates filled Piper Auditorium for Get Hired! (No Promises), a panel discussion and reception. Alumni and friends shared their expertise in the hiring process and career navigation. Students and recent graduates were exposed to both the private and public sectors and a range of employers, including the National Park Service, MIT Media Lab, Sasaki Associates, Northeastern University, Elkus Manfredi, and Supernormal. Alumni included: John Martin MArch ’89, Angel Williams MUP ’08, Elizabeth Christoforetti MArch ’09, and Margaret C. Brown MLA ’92. Nina Chase MLA ’12 and Chris SooHoo MArch ’16 moderated. Read a recap of this panel.
Taipei: Design Lecture by Dean Mohsen Mostafavi
On February 19, Dean Mohsen Mostafavi traveled to Taiwan for an AECOM sponsored design lecture on the future of design education at the Xue Xue Foundation. Following the Dean’s lecture was a panel discussion with thought leaders from Taiwanese architecture schools. Nancy Lin MArch ’97, chief of staff for AECOM Asia Pacific President Sean Chiao, organized this educational evening along with the GSD.
Jakarta: Elective Affinities Design Lecture and Reception
GSD alumni and friends joined together on Wednesday, February 24 in Jakarta with Felipe Correa MAUD ’03, associate professor of Urban Design. Correa also serves as Director of the Master of Architecture in Urban Design and Director of the Master of Landscape Architecture in Urban Design at the GSD. His design lecture, Elective Affinities: Architecture Across Scales in the Contemporary City, was followed by a reception. Current GSD students participating in the AECOM sponsored option studio Jakarta: Models of Collective Space for the Extended Metropolis, shared their preliminary work for the studio with alumni + friends.
Cambridge: GSD Alumni Council Student Portfolio Reviews
On March 3 and 4, the GSD Alumni Council Student Alumni XChange Committee hosted student portfolio reviews in Gund Hall. Twenty-three alumni shared their valuable insights and advice to help fifty-five future fellow alumni strengthen their career placement opportunities. 97% of participants found this to be a valuable way to connect with GSD alumni and students! Students found these to be effective sessions to gain guidance in their portfolio development for jobs and internships. For alumni, this was an opportunity to see cutting edge student work, assist students with job placement, and to reconnect with the GSD.
Berkeley: Bay Area Welcome Reception for Anita Berrizbeitia, FAAR, MLA ’87
Over 50 alumni and friends attended the Bay Area Welcome Reception to meet Professor Anita Berrizbeitia, FAAR, MLA ’87, the new Chair of the Department of Landscape Architecture, on Wednesday, March 16. A very special thank you to Peter Walker, FASLA, MLA ’57, Marty Poirier MLA ’86 and all the GSD alumni at PWP Landscape Architecture for hosting this engaging event. It was a beautiful evening to enjoy the PWP Landscape Architecture office, including their outdoor space.
London: GSD and Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners collaborate on London symposium
The GSD along with Rogers Stirk Harbour + Partners (RSHP) hosted the symposium Collaboration: The Lineage of an Architectural Practice, on Thursday, March 17, at the Leadenhall Building in London. RSHP’s history offers a remarkable lens on the task and the potential of architecture. Engaging with select themes and projects from RSHP’s nearly four decades of design, the symposium unraveled a series of issues that have been central to the firm’s practice and vital to the practice of architecture, including the role of collaboration and the question of architecture’s relationship to society.
Lord Rogers of Riverside, Graham Stirk, and Ivan Harbour were among the symposium’s speakers, who included RSHP collaborators past and present. Participants included Dean Mohsen Mostafavi, K. Michael Hays, Hanif Kara, and Farshid Moussavi from Harvard GSD; Laurie Abbott, Ricky Burdett, Mike Davies, Philip Gumuchdjian, Eva Jiřičná, John McAslan, and Chris Wilkinson, among others.
The symposium comprised three sessions, organized thematically around the firm’s history and evolution. Opening session “Tradition or Industrialisation?” trace the firm’s origins and its early relationship with industrial practice. Session Two, “The Public and the Private,” examined the firm’s private buildings, such as the Lloyd’s and Leadenhall buildings in London, alongside its public projects, including the Centre Pompidou and National Assembly of Wales. During the final session, “The Task of Architecture,” Rogers discussed the ongoing issue of social responsibility in architecture. He then joined Mostafavi, Moussavi, and Burdett for a conversation on the field’s potential for societal impact. Link for more information.
