News

David J. Lewis to Co-Host Regenerative Metropolis '24 Conference on September 27 at Parsons

This year’s international conference will be held on Friday of Climate Week, and brings together experts, architects, designers, fabricators, farmers, and policy makers to openly discuss the path toward a regenerative material future.

About the Event:

Architecture, at its best, embodies our wisest systems knowledge.  It provides for human thriving while integrating within all regenerative systems that support the thriving of all life.  Positive feedback loops within this type of infrastructure can ensure that abundance is ever increasing, rather than degrading. How can our cities deploy our best understanding of regenerative stewardship? Can urban architecture support best practices within sibling systems such as agriculture, land use, energy, and ecosystem stewardship?

We have many tools ready to create the regenerative metropolis: all-electric passive house high performance buildings, carbon sequestering materials such as those created from regenerating soils, holistic local ecological stewardship, and low toxicity products that support health along the entire value chain.  How do we scale these solutions so they become the norm? Can we design our cities to enable human activity to support these wise circular systems?  Can we align climate policy with social justice goals? Please join us as we seek to unpack these topics and discuss technologies, design, material science, un-siloed science, policy, frameworks, and project examples!

Marc Promoted to Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia GSAPP

LTL Architects is thrilled to share the announcement that Marc Tsurumaki has been promoted to Professor of Professional Practice in the Faculty of Architecture, Planning and Preservation at Columbia GSAPP.

From GSAPP: “Tsurumaki is principal and founder of LTL Architects @ltlarchitects in New York, and has a deep familiarity with GSAPP as a faculty member who has been teaching in the architecture programs since 2004. Marc Tsurumaki, in partnership with Paul Lewis and David J. Lewis at LTL Architects, has established a model for architectural practice in which research and publishing are intrinsically related to material development and design. The vastly influential book “Manual of Section” (2016) has been translated into six languages and remains a reference for understanding the ways in which the drawn section functions as representational techniques and reveals a building’s formal characteristics. Their more recent book, “Manual of Biogenic House Sections” (2022), presents a series of houses selected for using materials with beneficial environmental conditions – such as the capacity to sequester carbon or having low embodied carbon – and analyzes both their benefits at a time of climate crisis and their impact on the building’s section.

Alongside their publishing projects, LTL is an award-winning architecture practice that has sharpened its focus to study the environmental impact of architecture and develop methods that reduce embodied carbon through the use of plant and earth-based materials, carbon-capture, and material reuse. Their work operates at the intersection of spatial invention, material innovation, and collective experience.”

Exhibition of Biomaterials at Ball State

Biogenic House Sections, an exhibition of the work of LTL Architects based on the Manual of Biogenic House Sections is featured this winter in the main gallery of the College of Architecture at Ball State, Muncie, Indiana. We are greatly appreciative to Malcolm Cairns, Chair Olon Dotson, and the Faculty of the Department of Architecture for hosting this exhibition.

LTL at IIT February 21, 2024

David J. Lewis will be presenting the research and work on Biogenic House Sections on Wednesday 5:00pm in Crown Hall. Lecture to be followed by a discussion.

Biogenic House Sections | Traveling Exhibition

The exhibit about both our new book Manual of Biogenic House Sections and our designs for Five Biogenic Houses has traveled to four different schools this year and is scheduled for thee more locations through 2024.

September 20, 2023 to November 9, 2023: Ohio State University Knowlton School

May 6, 2023 to September 9, 2023: Toronto Metropolitan University

February 2, 2023 to April 14, 2023: University of Virginia School of Architecture

Biogenic Sections: Straw Exhibition at MIT

We are pleased to share our exhibit focused on the architectural potentials of straw as a structural insulation, on display until January 5, 2024 at Keller Gallery MIT School of Architecture and Planning. This exhibition is comprised of three parts: First is LTL’s new publication, Manual of Biogenic House Sections, of which straw is one of the ten chapters. Second are three small houses and two early childhood education buildings designed by LTL Architects that use jumbo straw bales as a catalyst for the building’s form, organization and spatial qualities. Third are straw experiments. Over the past six months, LTL has been testing different means to compress and bind straw into a building material to achieve both insulative and structural capacities simultaneously.

Intense Interiors

David J. Lewis will be giving an invited Keynote Lecture at Intense Interiors Symposium: Architecture & Film at Toronto Metropolitan University, Saturday, May 6th at 2:00pm. He will be speaking on the role of section as a form of representation, and a site of design, increasingly vital for the exploration of the spatial and interior possibilities of carbon-sequestering building materials.

Field to Form Presentation

Paul, David and Marc presented an Introduction to Building with Plants and Earth in the first panel of the Architectural League’s program From Field to Form on February 15, 2023 at Scholastic’s Auditorium. They were joined by Lola Ben-Alon, Mae-ling Lokko and Jonsara Ruth. Future Field to Form events are planned about stone, earth, hemp and straw.

Manual of Biogenic House Sections

We are extremely pleased to announce the release of our Manual of Biogenic House Sections. The book presents a visually compelling argument for rethinking the material basis of architecture in a time of environmental crisis. Asserting that the most viable means to radically reduce embodied carbon in new buildings is to use plant and earth based materials, the book demonstrates how this approach can catalyze new types of houses that reduce or sequester carbon, engage regenerative life cycles, and create healthier spaces for living. Building on the best-selling Manual of Section, the new book represents fifty-five innovative houses from around the world through intricately detailed cross-sectional perspectives and axonometrics complemented by photographs of construction processes, interiors and exteriors. Analytical drawings make legible an approach to architecture based on circular material logics and a more holistic relationship to our shared environment. ORO Editions | 352pgs | Available at ORO, Bookshop, Amazon

Biogenic House Sections Exhibition Opens at Princeton

Our new exhibit, Biogenic House Sections, is now on view at the Princeton University School of Architecture Gallery from October 6th through January 13, 2023. Starting from the recognition that the most viable means to reduce embodied carbon in new buildings is through the use of plant and earth-based materials, the exhibit explores how these assemblies can be a catalyst for architectural invention and new forms of dwelling. The exhibit is comprised of three parts: a presentation of house sections from our forthcoming new book, Manual of Biogenic House Sections, a selection of building materials organized by their embodied carbon, and five new house projects by LTL that use biogenic material assemblies as an impetus for building form, domestic organization and spatial seduction.

Photograph by Michael Vahrenwald

LTL Architects to Deliver 2022 Gil Oberfield Lecture

This Thursday, May 19 at 6pm, join LTL Architects as they deliver the 2022 Gil Oberfield Lecture. Founded in honor of former member and chair of the AIANY Interiors Committee, Gil Oberfield, this annual lecture is organized by the AIANY Interiors Committee and features speakers whose work excels in the field of interior architecture. This in-person event will be held at the Center for Architecture at 536 LaGuardia Pl. For more information and to register for the event, visit: https://calendar.aiany.org/2022/05/19/2022-gil-oberfield-lecture-ltl-architects/

LTL Architects Recipient of NYC Public Design Commission 2021 Award

Just Announced:  The Public Design Commission of New York City has awarded LTL Architects Excellence in Design for the Brownsville Library Renovation and Expansion in the 39th edition of this prestigious award.  The transformation is a project of the Department of Design and Construction and Brooklyn Public Library, designed in collaboration with Architectural Preservation Studio, Local Office Landscape + Urban Design, Silman, and ME Engineers.  This complete reworking of the Brownsville Library will restore the historic beauty of the 1908 Carnegie library while providing a new rooftop community gathering space.

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David J. Lewis to Present the Design Process of Cornell's Upson Hall, 6pm, Tuesday 10/13/20

The transformation of Upson Hall came through a collaborative partnership between architecture and engineering to create one of the most sustainable buildings on the campus of Cornell University and the home of the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. David will join Robert Goodwin (Perkins+Will), Robert Otani (Thornton Tomasetti) and Ed Bosco (me Engineers) in arguing for a new paradigm in how we sustainably and creatively address outmoded buildings.

Photo: Michael Moran/OTTOThe Transformation of Upson Hall: How an Outdated Post-War Building became a New Paradigm for Collaborative Learning, Innovative Research and Energy-Efficiency on the Cornell Campus. AIA New York: Center for Architecture. Tu…

Photo: Michael Moran/OTTO

The Transformation of Upson Hall: How an Outdated Post-War Building became a New Paradigm for Collaborative Learning, Innovative Research and Energy-Efficiency on the Cornell Campus. AIA New York: Center for Architecture. Tuesday October 13, 2020, 6pm-7:30. Register Here.

Manual of Physical Distancing Now Available

Manual of Physical Distancing is a visual assessment of the challenges of living in the time of Covid -19 illustrating the medical research and spatial recommendations tied to rates of spread of this virus. The goal is to use the visual practices of architecture to provide greater clarity over the spatial implications of addressing and mitigating Covid-19. Areas of study include rates of transmission, indoor vs outdoor risks, educational spaces, shared spaces of buildings, and public spaces in cities. This is a dynamic document, of which the most recent version is available online. This research work is lead by Paul Lewis, David J. Lewis and Marc Tsurumaki, along with Guy Nordenson.