Rock Print Press Kit

Gramazio Kohler Research, ETH Zurich

Fabio Gramazio and Matthias Kohler are architects with multi-disciplinary interests ranging from computational design and robotic fabrication to material innovation. In 2000, they founded the architecture practice Gramazio Kohler Architects, which has realised numerous award-winning projects integrating novel architectural designs within a contemporary building culture. Current projects include the design of the NEST research platform, a future living and working laboratory for sustainable building construction. Opening also the world’s first architectural robotic laboratory at ETH Zurich, their research has been formative in the field of digital architecture, setting precedence and de facto creating a new research field merging advanced architectural design and additive robotic fabrication. This ranges from 1:1 installations to the design of robotically fabricated high-rise buildings, and has been published in a large number of publications, further contributing to numerous exhibitions, such Structural Oscillations at the 2008 Venice Architecture Biennale, Pike Loop at the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York in 2009, and Flight Assembled Architecture at the FRAC Centre, Orléans, France, in 2011. Their recent research is outlined and theoretically framed in the book The Robotic Touch: How Robots Change Architecture (Park Books, 2014). Together with leading researchers in architecture, material sciences, computation and robotics, they have just launched the first architectural National Centre of Competence in Research on Digital Fabrication.

external page Self-Assembly Lab, MIT

Skylar Tibbits is currently a Research Scientist in MIT’s Department of Architecture, teaching graduate and undergraduate design studios and co-teaching How to Make (Almost) Anything, a seminar at MIT’s Media Lab. Skylar was recently awarded a 2013 Architectural League Prize, The Next Idea Award at Ars Electronica 2013, the Visionary Innovation Award at the Manufacturing Leadership Summit, a 2012 TED Senior Fellowship and was named a Revolutionary Mind in SEED Magazine’s 2008 Design Issue.

Previously, he has worked at a number of renowned design offices including: Zaha Hadid Architects, Asymptote Architecture and Point b Design. He has designed and built large-scale installations at galleries around the world, has been published extensively in outlets such as the New York Times, Wired, Nature, Fast Company, various peer-reviewed journals and books. Skylar has a Professional Degree in Architecture and minor in experimental computation from Philadelphia University. Continuing his education at MIT, he received a Masters of Science in Design Computation and a Masters of Science in Computer Science under the guidance of Patrick Winston, Terry Knight, Erik Demaine and Neil Gershenfeld. As director of the MIT Self-Assembly Lab Skylar focuses on self-assembly and programmable material technologies for novel manufacturing, products and construction processes. Started in 2007, Skylar Tibbits is also the founder and principal of a multidisciplinary design practice, SJET LLC.