The Cranbrook Academy of Art announced today that Gretchen Wilkins will be the new Head of the Architecture Department and the institution's ninth Architect-in-Residence. Amy Green Deines, the dean of Cranbrook Academy, praised Wilkins as “a collaborative leader with strong connections and a deep knowledge of the international architecture community”. 

Having nearly 20 years of architectural teaching and practice, Gretchen Wilkins is currently an Associate Professor and the Head of Design at RMIT University's Vietnam campus. She also previously directed RMIT’s Master of Urban Design program in Melbourne, Barcelona, and Ho Chi Minh City. She earned her Ph.D. from RMIT University and her M.Arch from the University of Michigan. 

From her teaching experience in Australia and Asia over the last decade, Wilkins continues to focus her work on the city and cultivating its creative and productive industries. Keeping her ties strong in Detroit, she has collaborated with the Detroit Riverfront Conservancy, Greening Detroit, and the Mexicantown Community Development Center. She also wrote the book “Distributed Urbanism: Cities After Google Earth”, which rose from the “Borderlands” symposium she curated in Detroit. 

Her projects “Future Factory” and “Post-Waterfront City” have been supported by the Australia-China Council, the Japan Foundation, and the Holcim Forum for Sustainable Construction.

“I am thrilled to lead the next chapter of Cranbrook Architecture and to continue the department’s amazing legacy of architectural practice, research and experimentation,” Wilkins said in a statement. “Detroit too has such a rich and important history, I’m very much looking forward to reconnecting to it.”