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Rationalizing Architecture through Research

April 9-10, 2026

Illinois School of Architecture

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Rationalizing Architecture through Research

This on-campus symposium will describe disciplinary and professional attempts to rationalize architecture through research. Our focus will be on architecture that is concerned with health, defined here to include both medical architecture and extra-medical spaces like workplaces and homes.
The main aim of the symposium is to reflect on the role of research in architecture, with specific attention to issues of information and embodiment. Another aim is to gauge the potential for interdisciplinarity between two School of Architecture program areas: Health and Well Being and History, Theory, Preservation.

Thursday, April 9, 5pm, Temple Buell Hall, room 227

  • Stuart Leslie (keynote): Johns Hopkins University Department of History of Science and Technology

Friday, April 10, 10AM-4PM, Siebel Center for Design

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April 9 - Keynote: Stuart Leslie

APRIL 9, 5pm

Temple Buell Hall, room 227

Stuart Leslie: ‘Minimal Means for Maximum Effect’: Butaro District Hospital, Rwanda and Tambacounda Pediatric and Maternity Hospital, Senegal

Day 2 - Sessions and Discussions

Please join us at the Siebel Center for Design on April 10th, from 9:30AM – 4PM. We will begin at 9:30AM with coffee and a welcome, with lunch offered from 1:00PM-2:00PM.

Session 1. Rationalizing the Hospital

Siebel Center for Design Sunset Studio, room 1050

10:00-11:20

David Theodore: Research-Hospital-Research: Automation is the Content of the Digital

Julie Zook: No More Than a Heap of Stones is a House: Why Evidence-Based Design Needs Theory

Geoffrey Goldberg: Inside, Outside, and Everything In-Between: Bertrand Goldberg’s Healthcare Projects

Session II. Architectural Research and the Pursuit of Health and Welfare

Siebel Center for Design Sunset Studio, room 1050

11:30-1:00

Avigail Sachs: Research and Performance: The Political Dimensions of Architectural Research

Kathryn Holliday: Telephone Shock: Design, Technology, and Health in the Workplace

Didem Ekici: Atmospheric Affections in the Age of Empire: David Boswell Reid’s Shipboard Ventilation Systems

Moderated comments: Bill Leslie

Ph.D. Lightning Talks

Siebel Center for Design Sunset Studio, room 1050

2:00-2:30 Lightning talks by UIUC PhD students

Discussion

Siebel Center for Design Starlight Room

2:40-4:00   Programming across health, theory, and practice

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