Kathy Velikov
Professor and Associate Dean for Research and Creative Practice
Kathy Velikov is Professor and Associate Dean for Research and Creative Practice at the University of Michigan Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning. She is a licensed Architect and founding partner of the research-based practice rvtr (www.rvtr.com), and the Vice President and former President of ACADIA (Association for Computer Aided Design in Architecture). Her work investigates and experiments with the intertwinements across architecture, the environment, technology, and sociopolitics through design methods that mobilize systems-based approaches and computational design. Her work ranges from material prototypes that explore environment-aware behavioral building skin assemblies, to high-performance building design, to research on urbanism, infrastructure, and territorial practices explored through techniques of mapping and analysis, speculative design propositions, installations, and writing. Her academic research has been funded by U.S. DOE NREL, NSF, U.S. DOT, U.S. EPA, Canada’s NRC and SSHRC, the AIA Upjohn Research Initiative, Guardian Industries, and Ford Motor Company.
Projects
Publications
BOOK VOLUMES
Dwyre, C., Perry, C., Salomon, D., & Velikov, K.(Eds.). (2022). Ambiguous Territory: Architecture, Landscape and the Postnatural. Barcelona: Actar.
Thün, G., Velikov, K., Ripley, C., & McTavish D. (2015). Infra Eco Logi Urbanism: A Project for the Great Lakes Megaregion. Zurich, CH: Park Books.
RECENT BOOK CHAPTERS
Velikov, K., & Thun, G. (2022). CH 3.5 Environment-Aware Behavioral Envelopes: Design Ecologies, Adaptive Geometries, and Technologies for Interaction. In Mitra Kanaani (ed.), Routledge Companion to Ecological Design Thinking in Architecture & Urbanism. (363-275). London: Routledge
Velikov, K., & Thun, G. (2022). Redistributing Sense-able Atmospheres. In J.S. Nesbitt (ed.), Nature of Enclosure (144-161). Barcelona and New York: Actar.
Thün, G., Sanyal, T., Velikov, K. (2021). Mapping the food energy water nexus across cascading scales: Contexts for Detroit from region to city. In R. Roggema (ed.), TransFEWmation: Towards design-led food-energy-water systems for future urbanization (171-207). London: Springer.
RECENT PEER-REVIEWED PUBLISHED CONFERENCE PAPERS
2022 Velikov, K. del Campo, M., Denit, L., Hasan, K. N., Xie, R., and Boyce, B. (2022). Design Engine: Generative Multi-Objective Performance Design Scenarios. In k. Dörfler, S. Paracho, J. Scott, B. Bogosian, B. Farahi, J. López, V. Noel (eds.). Realignments | Papers for the ACADIA 2021 Conference (122-133).
Thün, G., Velikov, K. (2021). Rethinking the delivery of social infrastructure: A systems based methodology and proposition. In Amps: The City and Complexity – Life, Design and Commerce in the Built Environment. London, UK: AMPS Vol 19, 388-399.
Tish, D., McGee, W., Schork, T., Thün, G., & Velikov, K. (2018). Topological design and optimization of robotic additively manufactured cable-nets. In C. Mueller, & S. Adriaenssens (eds.), Creativity in Structural Design: Proceedings of IASS Symposium 2018 (1-8). Cambridge, MA.: IASS.
RECENT JOURNAL ARTICLES
Velikov, K., & Thün, G. (2020). Fluid Territories: Cultivating common practices through the design of water redistribution. Journal of Architectural Education (JAE), Special Issue: Water, 74 (1), 92-100.
Tish, D., McGee, W., Schork, T., Thün, G., & Velikov, K. (2019). Case Studies in Topological Design and Optimization of Additively Manufactured Cable-Net Structures. Structures, 18, 83-90.
Velikov, K., Dwyre, C., Salomon, D. , & Perry, C. (2018). Ambiguous Territory: Aesthetic Practices Against Agrilogistics. FOOTPRINT Journal: The Architecture of Logistics, 23 (Autumn / Winter),147–159.