| Time: | October 1, 2025, 4:00 p.m. – 5:30 p.m. |
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| Venue: | City Campus, University of Stuttgart K1, M 11.11 |
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We are delighted to welcome Christopher Bamborough, Farnaz Fattahi, Lisa Lu, and Zayad Motlib, researchers from Arch_Manu (ARC Centre for Next-Generation Architectural Manufacturing, UNSW Sydney), to our upcoming Constructive Conversations event on Wednesday, 1 October 2025, from 16:00 to 17:30.
In this presentations, the researchers will share how Arch_Manu’s interdisciplinary research network of academic, industry, and institutional partners has addressed innovation barriers through five focused sub-groups: an Industry Transformation Training Centre (ITTC) with 30 industry embedded Higher Degree Research students, a government co-funded concrete 3D printed housing project, a software development group, a computational design consultancy firm, and a Continuous Professional Development (CPD) training platform.
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Topic: |
ARC Centre for Next-Gen Architectural Manufacturing |
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Speaker: |
Christopher Bamborough |
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Date: |
Wednesday, 1 October 2025 | 16:00 - 17:30 p.m. |
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Location: |
M 11.11 |
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This is an in person event. |
Abstract
In Australia and Europe, the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) sector has a problem, and it is big. The AEC sector uses the most resources on planet earth (60%), it produces the most landfill waste (50%), emits the most carbon (50%), and has a reputation for letting mega projects run over time (70%), over budget (86%), without delivering benefits to the public (99.5%). At the same time, the sector lags others in digitalisation efforts.
Despite these flaws, the sector is very important to all economies and vital for helping to achieve Australia’s net-zero target, while tackling housing shortages and infrastructure upgrades. However, despite its socio-economic importance, the AEC sector has been slow to adapt to digital advances.
AEC companies are already custodians of knowledge required to address decarbonisation and digitalisation aims, but they lack the necessary supporting mechanisms. However, the innovation challenge faced by the Architecture, Design and Engineering industry is that it is a fragmented collection of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in which research and innovation are low in the list of priorities due to budget constraints. Consequently, links between academia and industry are limited which reduces the ability to address sustainability issues.
In response, Arch_Manu was formed through an Australian Research Grant to set up a centre for Next Gen Architectural Manufacturing. In this presentation, we will share how Arch_Manu ‘s interdisciplinary research network of academic, industry and institutional partners have addressed this innovation barrier through five focussed sub-groups: an Industry Transformation Training Centre (ITTC) with 30 industry embedded Higher Degree Research students, a government co-funded concrete 3D printed housing project, a software development group, a computational design consultancy firm, and a Continuous Professional Development (CPD) training platform.
Speakers
Christopher Bamborough
Christopher Bamborough is a Research Fellow at the University of New South Wales, working within the ARC Centre for Next-Generation Architectural Manufacturing (Arch_Manu).
His research examines the role of data in architectural practice, focusing on its technical, cultural, and material impacts. His PhD thesis argued that while data has long been integral to architecture, its digital form introduces a significant and evolving non-human influence on practice. AI and automation are central to this shift, raising critical questions about authorship and the evolving role of human designers. Dr Bamborough’s work highlights the moments where architects enter into machine collaboration and explores the practical and material consequences of these interactions.
Trained as an architect in both the UK and Australia, Dr Bamborough worked across Architecture and Design for Manufacture (DfM) practices before transitioning into academia, where he has spent over 15 years teaching, lecturing and researching computational design, digital fabrication and construction.
Farnaz Fattahi
Farnaz is the CPD Lead at Arch_Manu, bringing over 12 years of experience in teaching and course development. She has previously served as the Interim Manager and Executive Lead in the ARC ITTC for Next-Gen Architectural Manufacturing. Farnaz has been a Course Coordinator and an educator at esteemed institutions like the University of New South Wales and the University of Technology Sydney, where she developed both practical and theoretical course materials. As a Project Advisor for the Work Integrated Learning (WIL) program at UNSW, she guided multi-disciplinary teams to develop engagement strategies with organisations such as the Powerhouse (MAAS) and the Australian National Maritime Museum (ANMM). Farnaz holds a master’s in Digital Architecture and has collaborated on the design and development of numerous research and fabrication-focused projects promoting sustainable design within numerous institutions including the University of Stuttgart and University of Technology Sydney. Her PhD at UNSW, titled Spatial Provocateur, focuses on addressing built environment challenges with critical urgency.
Her background in digital architecture and fabrication, combined with her academic and research experience, positions her as a catalyst for the development of essential lifelong learning and CPD courses to address the urgent challenges in the built environment.
Lisa Lu
Lisa is a leadership and organisational behaviour researcher working at the intersection of management theory and behavioural change. Joining Arch_Manu from the School of Management and Governance, UNSW Business School, her PhD research in charisma and leadership utilises mixed methods to develop a taxonomy of leadership behaviours and explore how these behaviours can be effectively taught and expressed via digital modalities. At UNSW, Lisa has taught courses on entrepreneurial ecosystems, managing pay and performance, and human resource management. Her diverse professional background spans primary healthcare, project management, and policy and standards development across sectors including data, artificial intelligence, health, workplace safety, building & construction, and energy.
Lisa's current research at Arch_Manu focuses on two topics. The first investigates institutional change in the AEC sector, with an aim to understand how to embed digital capability. The second explores the future of ADE through human-led and AI-supported scenario analysis with the intent of building strategic foresight capability in ADE organisations and support their decision-making effectiveness in times of uncertainty.
Zayad Motlib
Zayad is an interdisciplinary architect, designer, and researcher focused on information-based digital design and sustainable systems. He currently leads the computational design division at Arch_Manu, [the ARC Centre for Next Gen Architectural Manufacturing], at UNSW, Sydney. With over 30 years of professional experience, primarily in practice, Zayad is a licensed architect with the Australian Registration Board (ARB, RAIA) in Australia and New Zealand. In academia, Zayad most recently served as an associate professor at Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool University (XJTLU) in Suzhou, China, where he spent five years and was appointed director of the digital design group. Additionally, he founded d-NAT (Design Network for Art, Architecture, and Technology) in 2014, a collaborative research network exploring design possibilities at the intersection of natural systems, design, and technology. Zayad’s current research investigates the interaction between humans and evolutionary algorithms in the context of the built environment. This research aims to establish a dialogue between humans and machine intelligence through a collaborative design process, enabling the capture of designers’ intentions and creativity.
About
Arch_Manu is an Industrial Transformation Training Centre that was funded by the Australian Research Council in 2022, and officially commenced in February 2024. It is hosted out of the University of New South Wales (Sydney) and supported by nodes at Swinburne University of Technology (Melbourne) and the University of Adelaide.
Arch_Manu brings together academics, researchers, and industry experts from Architecture, Engineering, Management and Governance, Information Systems, Computer Science, Computational Design, Industrial Design, and Construction Management to investigate how data and digital strategy can help the AEC Sector meet critical sustainability and productivity goals.
Our program of industry-embedded PhDs, national and international placements, sector-focused short courses, and postdoctoral projects will grow knowledge, skills, and capacity within the AEC workforce, while delivering novel digital tools and frameworks to help drive the digital transformation of the sector.
Link: https://archmanu.com/
