MTRL 2020: Envisioning Innovative Materials Applications

The MTRL 2020 Conference is coming to a close today, and it’s been a whirlwind of great interdisciplinary talks given by great lecturers. First up: Inna Alesina Inna is a product designer and a professor at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). Inna talked about a return to older or existing materials, finding new [...]

Traumatized Body as Site for Post Crisis Response Shelters

I am developing wearable environments for post crisis situations. As such, the traumatized body is the site for design- a concept that deviates from the traditional disaster relief shelter. I’ll spare you all the theory (ask me and I’ll divulge), but this series of “site models” represents the psychological and physical traumatized body expressed as [...]

Ethiopian Architecture in Photos 2.1: Italian Occupation, Gondar

The 1930′s (1933-1941) occupation of Ethiopia marked Italy’s second failed attempt to colonize the nation. During this period, Italians constructed a vital city equipped with a post office, cinemas, hotels and roads for the military and their visitors. However, this displaced many Ethiopians. A war ensued in Ethiopia (and abroad) and Italians ditched their campaign [...]

Edith Head

Ethiopian Architecture in Photos 2.0: The Royal Enclosure, Gondar

Gondar sits in the mountainous, northwest region of Ethiopia. It was the nation’s capital before Addis Ababa when the city of Gondar grew to its height between the seventeenth and nineteenth centuries. The emperors during this period had so much wealth and power that they entertained and met with European leaders from countries like France [...]

Ethiopian Architecture in Photos 1.1: Addis Ababa University

The ETH Zurich School of Architecture in Addis Ababa is a collaborative between Ethiopian and Swiss students and teachers. The remote branch of Addis Ababa University is a playground of design-build projects by students. A bamboo structure sits in a field as an exercise in structures (I bet they had fun calculating those forces!). Adjacently, [...]

Ethiopian Architecture in Photos 1.0: Addis Ababa

I took these photographs during the summer of 2010 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on a research travel grant from the University of Cincinnati. The 1.0 album focuses on famous cathedrals in the capital city. Ethiopia was the first country to adopt Christianity in the fourth century AD. Today over half of the county practices that [...]

New Portfolio 2011

Open publication

Ethiopia

(this little guy was an excellent tour guide) I traveled to Ethiopia this summer and photo-documented the journey. The images will be presented in a multi-part, two-week long series exhibiting architecture from different parts of the country. There will be some famous monuments and cathedrals- and some interesting finds- covering the vast history of Ethiopia [...]

Look for something unexpected in 2 months

I’m working on a top secret project. The results will be posted when it’s complete. Check back to see what it is!