The University of Michigan’s Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning welcomes new practice leaders and emerging talent to its faculty, enhancing our expertise at the intersection of architecture, design and urbanism with technology, health, and contemporary culture.

Sir David Adjaye OBE joins the college in winter 2019 as the Clipson Visiting Professor in Architecture. He will teach an advanced prototyping course with Master of Science Digital and Material Technologies Director and Associate Professor of Architecture Catie Newell. The course is part of Taubman College’s pursuit of building sector innovations. Adjaye, Newell, and students will explore a material concept or method, facilitated by the expertise and machinery in our fabrication lab. David Adjaye will also deliver a public lecture during the winter term.

Adjaye is recognized as a leading architect of his generation. The firm now has offices in London, New York, and Accra with projects in the U.S., U.K., Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. His largest project to date, the $540 million Smithsonian Institute National Museum of African American History and Culture, opened on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., in fall 2016 and was named Cultural Event of the Year by The New York Times. He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II and was recognized as one of the 100 most influential people of the year by TIME magazine.

Cyrus Peñarroyo begins a tenure-track appointment as an assistant professor of architecture, after having joined the college in 2015 as the Muschenheim Fellow. Peñarroyo is a designer and educator, whose work explores the interplay between architecture and contemporary digital culture, particularly in the way that the construction and circulation of images are reshaping the built environment. He co-founded the design practice EXTENTS with Associate Professor of Architecture McLain Clutter in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Previously, he worked for LTL Architects in New York, the Office for Metropolitan Architecture in New York, and Bureau Spectacular in Chicago. Peñarroyo received his M.Arch from Princeton University, and his B.S. in Architecture Summa Cum Laude from the University of Illinois Chicago.

Dr. Upali Nanda joins the college as an associate professor of practice in architecture. Dr. Nanda is director of research at HKS, a global architecture firm, where she leads and implements healthcare and design research projects. She also serves as the executive director at the Center for Advanced Design Research and Evaluation (CADRE), a non-profit initiative of HKS. In January, she will teach design and health courses at the college and, along with other Taubman College faculty, will pursue interdisciplinary research with the the U-M Medical community. In August, she was honored by Architectural Record with the 2018 Women in Architecture Innovator Award.

“We are drawing new faculty who are inventive and bring strength to our disciplines, including human-centered design, emerging urbanisms, critical thinking, and design studies,” said U-M Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning Dean Jonathan Massey.

Returning visiting faculty include Visiting Associate Professor in Architecture Clement Blanchet; Visiting Assistant Professor in Architecture Andrew Moddrell; and Charles Moore Visiting Professor in Architecture Emmanuel Pratt. Historian Łukasz Stanek will teach two courses in the winter term.

The college welcomes new fellows to support academic programming and strategic initiatives. The architecture faculty fellowships awarded this year belong to Gabriel Cuellar, Oberdick Fellow (Project); Liz Gálvez, Muschenheim Fellow (Design); and Peter Yi (B.S. ’10), Sanders Fellow (Research). Joining the Urban and Regional Planning faculty this year is Dr. Claudia Isaac, Sojourner Truth Fellow. Bryan Norwood joins the Michigan Society of Fellows. Sara Timberlake (M.Arch ’18), Young-Tack Oh (M.Arch ’15), Manuel Shvartzberg-Carrió, and Nora Krinitsky will join the college as Michigan Mellon Fellows.

New this year, a multi-year Postdoctoral Fellowship will support emerging scholars who will contribute to the college’s project of remaking academia and practice through academic innovation, while contributing to the University’s diversity, equity, and inclusion agenda. In January, we will be joined by the first Taubman Postdoctoral Fellow, Arash Adel.

The College also welcomes new lecturers in architecture.

Jacob Comerci is a lecturer in architecture. He previously worked with Bureau Spectacular in Chicago and Los Angeles and with MOS Architects and LTL Architects in New York. Comerci received his M.Arch from Princeton University and his B.S. in Architecture from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Irene Hwang is a lecturer in architecture and begins a two-year appointment as the assistant chair of architecture. She served as director of business development for the New York-based Deborah Berke Partners, where she was responsible for efforts to build new opportunities, as well as support long-standing relationships. She previously taught at the University of Michigan as the 2010-2011 Oberdick Fellow, as well as Northeastern University; the Universitat Internacional de Catalunya; Universitat Polytécnica de Catalunya; and Elisava, the Escola Superior de Disseny (Barcelona). Hwang received her M.Arch (with commendation) from Harvard University and completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

Athar Mufreh is a lecturer in architecture. She is also co-founder of the Brooklyn-based architecture practice Cadaster with incoming Oberdick Fellow Gabriel Cuéllar. The firm explores the relationship between architecture and territory. Mufreh received a masters degree in integrated urbanism and sustainable design from Stuttgart University and a B.Arch. from Birzeit University, West Bank, Palestine.

Nicholas Quiring is a lecturer in architecture and is the founder of 515 Studio, a collaborative forum to develop design ideas with other artists and architects. He received his M.Arch from the University of Michigan Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning and his B.F.A. from University of Michigan Stamps School of Art & Design.

For more about Taubman College faculty