Birmingham UK, National Stadium Bid - J Parrish - Arup Sport

Lars Hesselgren
AA Dip, RIBA, M Sc UCL - Senior Associate Partner, Director R&D KPF London.

He graduated at the AA and took his M Sc at Bartlett School of Architecture where he was research assistant to Bill Hillier of the Space Syntax group. After 10 years at Halcrow working on large Port projects in the Middle East he joined YRM where he was associate partner in charge of CAD development. While there he was the chief Beta tester of Intergraph’s Master Architect.

He used the underlying technology (Intergraph’s I/EMS) to create an early example of parametric architectural modelling of the Waterloo International roof arches (architects Grimshaw).

In 1991 he joined KPF where he is responsible for all IT services. He is however intimately involved in projects and has CAD modelled hundreds of KPF proposals. He has spearheaded the use of CAM technology in the firm, culminating in the proposal for the Parkhaven tower, a 392m mixed use tower in Rotterdam. In 2001 he was in charge of the imaging of the Heron tower for the Public Enquiry which lead to the creation of the largest CAD 3D model of London exclusively for KPF.

He created and chaired The MicroStation Community (UK) in 1996 following the Intergraph/Bentley split. He works extensively with Bentley and many of the features in today’s MicroStation are directly attributable to him. He has been External Examiner to East London University and has lectured extensively in the UK and internationally. In 2002 Bentley awarded him the Bentley Lifetime Achievement Award.

Hugh Whitehead
Project Director - Specialist Modelling Group, Foster and Partners

Hugh Whitehead graduated from Liverpool University in 1973 where he was awarded a First Class Honours Degree for research on Optimisation, applied in an architectural context. The thesis explored the potential for using mathematical techniques, such as hill climbing routines, as an aid to design, but also researched the problem of how to educate designers so that they learn how to construct a solution space, which can then be explored programmatically.

After eight years working as an Architect on large Planning Projects in the Middle East and Africa, Hugh joining YRM in London in 1983 at the time when they bought their first CAD system from Intergraph. During the next twelve years he became an Associate and was CAD Applications Manager. He also specialised in model building for design and visualisation, which led to the formation of a successful consultancy. During the next two years he worked on six winning entries for Millennium Competitions and had four animations broadcast on national television.

In 1998 he was invited to join Foster and Partners to set up the Specialist Modelling Group, whose brief is to carry out Research and Development in an environment which is intensely project driven. This challenge has given the original degree thesis a new significance. Computing technology has now come of age and in the digital era the techniques are taking on a new relevance.

Recent projects include the SwissRe Headquarters and the new City Hall in London. His principal interest in computational design tools is the integration of analysis routines with geometry control mechanisms.

J R J Parrish
BA Arch B Arch RIBA - Director, Arup Sport

J Parrish joined Arup in 2000 to lead Arup Sport and to provide sports architecture design and technical expertise.

He has specialised in sports venue design since the mid 1970's and, prior to joining Arup, was the concept designer of Stadium Australia, centrepiece of the Sydney Olympics, Cardiff's Millennium Stadium, venue for the 1999 Rugby World Cup and Stadium for the Nineties, the prototype for the RIBA Building of the Year Award winning McAlpine Stadium in Huddersfield.

An acknowledged expert in sightlines, stand, bowl and roof geometry, J is also an experienced sports architecture consultant. He has worked with Foster & Partners and Richard Rogers Partnership on competition entries for the Stade de France in Paris and on Oita and Saitama stadiums in Japan. Prior to joining Arup Sport he worked as a consultant to Arup on the new Manchester City Stadium.

Recent projects include Birmingham’s bid for the English National Stadium and Cardiff AFC’s new stadium capable of phased development from 30,000 to 60,000 seats. He currently leads the Arup Sport sports architecture team working with Herzog & DeMeuron on the new Allianz Arena being built in Munich for the 2006 World Cup and as the new home for Bayern Munich and TSV 1860.

His computer skills were used in creating the concept designs for Stadium Australia, Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium and Stadium for the Nineties. All were designed directly on computer in 2D and 3D without the aid of paper prints or concept sketches and with the 3D models being used for the production of 2D drawings, rendered images and animations.

A keen advocate of the use of computers in architecture, he developed the world's first computer sightlines programme more than twenty years ago. His latest specially developed parametric stadium and arena design software places Arup Sport at the forefront of sports venue design.

J is a regular speaker at international conferences on sports venue design and the use of computer technology in architecture.

Dr Robert Aish
Director of Research
Bentley Systems.

Robert Aish is graduate of the School of Industrial Design at the Royal College of Art, London. His Ph.D. is in Human Computer Interaction, from the Man-Machine Lab at the University of Essex. His post doctoral research was the development of computer aided design tools for design participation at the ABACUS research group at the University of Strathclyde.

As a software developer he wrote building services applications for Arup, architectural modelling applications for YRM and ship building applications for Intergraph.

His role at Bentley is to establish how object oriented technologies can be harnessed to create a more appropriate design paradigm for architecture and building engineering. Rather than focus on specific application semantics, this research is aimed at identifying the common abstractions, which underlie the open-ended design process, which characterises the AEC domain. These abstractions include: design dependencies, deferral management and extensibility.

This research has resulted in the implementation of a new package called 'Generative Components' which is intended to be a framework within which the design research community and inspired architectural practitioners can innovate.

Alan Penn, MSc, DipArch, ARC

Alan Penn is a registered architect, but his academic work spans the disciplines of the built environment and computing. He worked in the construction industry for the Trafalgar House Group, RMJM Architects, and for the Architects department in a Regional Health Authority, before joining the Bartlett, UCL, as a research fellow in 1984. He was appointed to a new initiative lectureship in urban design and regeneration in 1989 in the School of Planning. He gained a Senior Lectureship in 1996 and a Readership in Architectural and Urban Computing in 1999. He is Director of the Foresight Challenge Award VR Centre for the Built Environment established in 1996 (see www.vr.ucl.ac.uk). He has sat on EPSRC Programme Review, Strategy and Panel committees and is a member of the UK Government’s Foresight Construction Associate Programme task force on ICT. He was awarded an HEFCE Business Fellowship in 2001.

Since 1990 he has held 20 major funded research grants, 13 as principal investigator, scoring a4 and a5 on review in the majority of those rated to date. Of these 6 are each worth between £1m and £4.3m in total value. Funding comes from a range of sources including DTI, OST, EPSRC, EC and industry, and involves major collaborations with (and over 50% funding from) UK, European and USA industry. He currently has 100% industry funded research projects worth nearly £300k. His current research grants involve active collaboration with a total of 27 companies and 6 universities or research institutes, in the UK, Europe and the USA. He was awarded EPSRC Platform funding in 2000 in recognition of the international standing of his research activity. This is being used to develop fundamental new lines of research into the analysis of built space and the computer simulation of social organisations. This research has already resulted in a new patent application. He holds a number of EC FP5 projects under the IST programme, including TOWER (virtual reality and ambient awareness for work environments), ARTHUR (augmented reality round table for architectural and urban design) and RADICAL (performance and virtual media).

In 1995 he helped to establish the MSc in Virtual Environments, to train designers in high-end VR computer programming and simulation, the first such course in the country. It has to date trained over 40 postgraduates who are highly sought after in the new media and design industries. He has recently been awarded funding for an Engineering Doctorate programme in Virtual Environments, Imaging and Visualisation, in partnership with UCL’s Department of Computer and some 20 sponsoring businesses. This will give rise to a cohort of 40 Research Engineers based primarily in industry over the next four years.

He is a founder director of Space Syntax Ltd. a UCL ‘spin-in’ company, based within the university which acts as a major channel for technology transfer, licensing and industry funded short programme research projects. SSL has a research turnover approaching £.5 m per annum. Since 1987 SSL has carried out over 200 applications research projects in a range of fields including urban masterplanning, laboratory and innovative office planning, retail and hospital design, housing, crime and crowd management (see www.spacesyntax.com). These projects have been fully funded by business, local government or the community and are directly related to live construction or urban regeneration projects. Many of these projects are high profile local and national projects with leading international architects and consultant engineers.

Alan’s research group currently has 12 funded research fellows and hosts over 40 doctoral researchers, whilst SSL has a complement of 12 full time staff. This is one of the largest VR related research groups in the UK.

Paul Richens MA DipArch RIBA
Fellow, Churchill College
Director, Martin Centre

After studying Natural Science and Architecture at King's College, Paul Richens joined Applied Research of Cambridge where he developed some of the earliest software for architectural CAD, such as OXSYS, BDS and GDS. He founded the Martin Centre CADLAB in 1991, and has been Director since 1992. He is a Fellow of Churchill College, a Director of Informatix Software International, and Advisor to the National Film and Television School on digital media.

Axel Kilian
Ph.D. scholar in Design and Computation, Department of Architecture
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge USA

After receiving his Architectural degree at the University of the Arts Berlin in 1998, Axel Kilian completed a Master of Science on a Fulbright scholarship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2000.

Since 2001 he has been a Ph.D. student in the Design and Computation group in the Department of Architecture at MIT and focuses on the application of programming in Design. Axel Kilian has co-taught workshops and as a TA a design studio with the focus on parametric and generative tools using CATIA and a variety of other software in the Architecture Department of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Benachir Medjdoub
DipArch, Msc, PhD
Lecturer, School of the Built Environment,
University of Nottingham

A trained Architect, Benachir obtained his doctorate in computer aided design in 1996 from École Centrale de Paris. The PhD thesis explored the potential for using optimisation techniques and constraint programming techniques, as an aid to automate space planning in architectural design. In November 1997, he joined the Martin Centre at the University of Cambridge to carry on his post doctoral research.
His research has resulted in the implementation of several CAD software prototypes. Among which a 2D parametric sketcher in architecture and an automatic plant room designer.
In April 2001, He was appointed lecturer at the School of the Built Environment, University of Nottingham, where he lectures Computer Aided design, Virtual & Augmented Reality and Design.
Recent research project include automation in construction, augmented reality in architecture, 3D modelling of complex geometry and parametric technology in CAD. He is a principal investigator of several research projects funded by the EPSRC, the industry and the University of Nottingham.

Dr Chris Williams
Senior Lecturer in Structural Design and Engineering
Department of Architecture & Civil Engineering
University of Bath

Chris Williams joined Ted Happold’s group at Ove Arup in the early 1970’s where was responsible for the structural analysis of the Frei Otto grid shells for the Mannheim Budesgartenschau.

Since then he has been a lecturer and researcher at the University of Bath with a particular interest in the formfinding and structural analysis of shell, fabric and bridge structures. Recent projects for which he has written software include the Japanese Pavilion Expo 2000 (Shigeru Ban Architects, Buro Happold), Weald and Downland Grid Shell (Edward Cullinan Architects, Buro Happold) and the British Museum Great Court Roof (Foster and Partners, Buro Happold).

Chris Fanning
MEng (hons) MSE & Management

Part-time Events and Web Administration for the SmartGeometry Group

After receiving an Arkwright design scholarship, Chris completed his engineering Masters at the University of Warwick in 2003 with experience in CAD and 3D modelling. Upon graduating he worked for the civil service until moving to Southampton to learn web technologies and html. Since commencing his degree, Chris has worked in various roles as a I.T. hardware specialist, focusing on graphics and acoustic performance whilst learning about all aspects of networking for consumer and SME systems.

He joined the SmartGeometry group in December of 2004 to work as a part-time administrator, dividing his efforts between the current website and assisting with the organisation of future events such as conferences and workshops.

Current projects involve courses in ASP, Java, JSP and SQL with the intention to improve the SmartGeometry website with new features when necessary.