Staff

Carola Hein is Professor and Head, Chair History of Architecture and Urban Planning at Delft University of Technology. She trained in Hamburg (Diplom‑Ingenieurin) and Brussels (Architecte) and earned her doctorate at the Hochschule für bildende Künste Hamburg in 1995. She has published and lectured widely on topics in contemporary and historical architectural and urban planning—notably in Europe and Japan—and has authored several articles and books on capital city issues in Brussels, Strasbourg, Luxembourg, Berlin, and Tokyo. From 1995 to 1999 she was a Visiting Researcher at Tokyo Metropolitan University and Kogakuin University, focusing on the reconstruction of Japanese cities after World War II and the Western influence on Japanese urban planning. Among other major grants, in 2004, she held a grant by the Brussels-Capital Region Government to investigate the urban location and architectural expression of the European capital function. In 2005-06 she has been working with a grant from the Lincoln Institute for Land Policy for research on Regional integration and land policies affecting the future development of Tallinn, Warsaw, and Budapest. In 2007, she received a Guggenheim Fellowship to pursue research on The Global Architecture of Oil.With an Alexander von Humboldt fellowship she investigated large scale urban transformation in Hamburg in international context between 1842 and 2008. Her current interest is the study of international networks and the transmission of architectural and urban ideas along these networks, focusing specifically on port cities and the global architecture of oil.

Carola Hein has authored The Capital of Europe. Architecture and Urban Planning for the European Union (Praeger, 2004), and has edited Port Cities: Dynamic Landscapes and Global Networks London: Rutledge 2011; (with Pierre Laconte (eds,)) Brussels: Perspectives on a European Capital. Brussels: Publication of the Foundation for the Urban Environment, 2007. Bruxelles l’Européene: Capitale de qui? Ville de qui?/ European Brussels. Whose capital? Whose city? Brussels: Cahiers de la Cambre-Architecture n 5, Brussels: La Lettre Volée, 2006; (with Philippe Pelletier (eds.)). Cities, Autonomy and Decentralization in Japan. London: Routledge, 2006/2009: (with Jeffry Diefendorf, and Yorifusa Ishida (eds.)), Rebuilding Urban Japan after 1945. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. She has also published numerous articles in peer-reviewed journals, books, and magazines.

Herman van Bergeijk (b.1954) is an architectural historian who studied in the Netherlands (Groningen) and Italy (Venice). After working abroad and teaching at many universities in the United States, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands he obtained his Ph.D. in 1995 with a study into the work of the architect and town planner W.M. Dudok. In 1997 he was appointed at the University of Technology in Delft. In 2003 he taught a year at the Bauhausuniversität in Weimar. Since 2004 he is an Associate Professor in Architectural History in Delft. He has curated many exhibitions and published extensively on 17th and 20th Dutch and Italian architecture. Recent publications are: Het handschrift van de architect. Schetsen van Nicolaas Lansdorp en tijdgenoten (together with Michiel Riedijk)(2014), Aesthetic Economy. Objectivity in Dutch architecture (2014), and Jan Duiker, bouwkundig ingenieur (1890-1935). Van warm naar koud (2016). In the moment he is studying the more traditional architects in the 20^th century, especially the work of A.J. Kropholler. He is an editor of the cultural magazine Eigenbouwer.

Everhard Korthals-Altes has been teaching Art History at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Technology in Delft since 2005. The (international) reception and collecting of Dutch seventeenth- and eighteenth-century painting, and the boundaries between art and architecture (e.g. the representation of architecture in Dutch seventeenth- and eighteenth-century art) are his fields of special interest.

Current research includes the project: The visualization of Architecture and Urbanism in the Arts between 1600 and 1800. Community pride and urban identity culminate in streets, squares and monumental buildings. They act as a dynamic billboard that addresses citizens and visitors alike: they represent what the city (or powerful factions within the citizenry) wishes to represent. These representative qualities are greatly enhanced by the use of the visual arts which depicted the city’s most important public spaces and representative buildings. Similar illustrations often embellished maps of the city. The visual arts condensed the representative qualities of the cityscape as well as providing it with a public not necessarily living in the city - this, obviously, was the case with artistic work which could be reproduced, such as engravings.

Tino Mager studied media technology in Leipzig and art history and communication science in Berlin, Barcelona and Tokyo; 2004 graduate engineer (Diplom), 2009 Magister Artium. In 2015 he received his PhD at the Institute for Art and Historical Urban Studies of the TU Berlin with the thesis "Schillernde Unschärfe - der Begriff der Authentizität im architektonische Erbe“. The dissertation was funded by an Elsa Neumann Fellowship and was awarded the interdisciplinary Tiburtius Prize (1st prize) for outstanding dissertations. He completed research stays in Japan and at the University of California, Los Angeles and was a lecturer at the Technical University of Berlin and the ITU Istanbul. Subsequently, scientific assistant at the Chair of History and Theory of Architecture at the TU Dortmund and postdoctoral fellow of the Leibniz Association. Since 2017 he has been a postdoc at the Chair of History of Architecture and Urban Planning at the TU Delft.

Tino's main interests include heritage conservation and cultural heritage theory. In addition, he has published on post-war modernist architecture and its preservation, on Japanese architecture and the transnational education of artists in the 19th century. As part of the ArchiMediaL project, he is working on the development of methods for the use of artificial intelligence in architectural historical research. 

Reinout Rutte (Roelofarendsveen 1972) is an urban and architectural historian. He studied history of architecture at the Free University in Amsterdam and historical geography at the University of Amsterdam, where he also finished his PhD thesis Stedenpolitiek en stadsplanning in de Lage Landen (12de-13de eeuw) [Urban politics and city planning in the Low Countries, 12^th-13^th centuries]. He has published and edited several articles and books about the history of the city and urbanism in The Netherlands, and about the making and mapping of the Dutch landscape. After his PhD-research at the University of Amsterdam he worked at the Netherlands Institute for Spatial Research (RPB, The Hague) on the book Tussenland [Shadowland]. Since 2004 he has been an assistant professor at the Chair History of Architecture and Urban Planning at the Faculty of Architecture of the Delft University of Technology. In 2016 he published the Atlas of the Dutch Urban Landscape. A Millennium of Spatial Development.

The scope of this study is to enlighten the consequences of increasing threats on the urban/rural morphologies and typologies, the conflicts between urban transformation and conservation of local built heritage in creating a sustainable development in the Black Sea Region in Turkey. The main objective is to preserve the existing built fabric by reusing the existing traditional materials, avoiding demolition and upgrading the historic towns with minimal intervention, to serve as a self reliant, cost effective eco towns and villages.

This research is related to oil and urban transformation in Iran as one of the oil-rich countries in the world. The research examines how oil development during Iran's oil boom (60's and 70's) has triggered urban transformation from traditional city to modern one from both spatial and socio-cultural aspects. It approaches the subject through the lens of media as one of the best reflection of socio-cultural characteristics of the society. So, it aims to investigate to what extent Media directly and indirectly affected the process of urban transformation by creating positive image of oil industry and changing people's mindset in order to accept a new lifestyle. During Iran's modernization, coincidence of both the active presence of woman in the society and the emergence of oil industry has created intertwined relationship between woman and new space, modern society, media and more importantly oil industry. In short, the research investigates how oil has translated into cityscape, media and gender.  

Registering Conflicts: Spatial Production Under Traumatic Conditions

Promoter: Prof. Dr. Carola Hein
Daily Supervisor: Dr. Marc Schoonderbeek

This research investigates the impact of the trauma caused by the Lebanese civil war and its ramifications, on the production of spaces in Beirut, based on a recognition of space as both an open product of social action and a structuring agency for further actions and spaces.  The research works on reconstructing a narrative of the everyday spatial practices in Beirut throughout the 15 years of the conflict. Following an interdisciplinary approach, it aims for fetching and collecting registers of spatial production by means of combining narrative and archival analyses with critical forensics of the built environment. The main objective of this work is to provide a comprehensive understanding of traumatic urbanism through directing the focus to the traumatic moment itself, as it benefits from the relatively long duration of the Lebanese civil war to observe and understand the spatiality of the civil, urban conflict.

Port-city development in Rotterdam and Naples: Entanglements in port and city decision-making processes.

Promotors: Prof. Carola Hein (TUD) & Prof. Michelangelo Russo (Unina)

Over the last fifty years, economic and technological transformations put into motion by containerization, planning strategies, political decision-making, and the consequent relocation of port activities outside the urban centers, have radically transformed the relations between city and port with deep consequences on the quality of life surrounding the port, urban form and local identity. Very often engineering port is the result of a sectorial and functional planning from port-related authorities. This is the main problem that creates difficulties in defining a common planned strategy about ports and port-cities. Recen debates among port engineers, as well as city officials, point to a need to reconnect planning for port and city. Studying the relationship between city and port from a functional, morphological, or historical point of view is not enough. Professional co-operation at different levels and scales is needed for the improvement of the approach to the topic. And a better understanding of historical engagement among the maing actors should take into account on one hand the needs of port actors, and on the other the needs of both local authorities and citizens.

Research methodology: The research, focused mainly on the built envirnomnet, but also open to the dialogue with other disciplines, will investigate the intense interaction between different acotrs to find a common tool to facilitate the co-operation among them in order to design a port as added value within the city. 

Shaping of urban imagery in Tehran through architectural and urban competitions based on government decisions before and after the revolution of 1979.

City imagery of many urban cities is connected to the architectural competitions, which have been held during different political systems. The focus of this research is the city of Tehran, the Iranian capital, wherein the impact of the government’s decisions for the city imagery of Tehran is visible on many architectural elements. This research is a compilation of various methods that examines the role and value of the architectural and urban competitions throughout the history of modernization in Tehran comparing the two periods of before and after the 1979 revolution.  This research will demonstrate the effect of political changes on the urban design and the urban imagery in Tehran.

Research Methodology:  The methodology of the thesis will be as follows:

1. Investigating the two case studies of competitions during the Pahlavi dynasty (Last kingdom in Iran,  1925-1979):
   1. Azadi Tower- an open competition; 1971
   2. Abbas Abbad Tehran City Center, Kahn’s and Tange’s project – a closed competition;  1950s - 70's
2. Investigating the two case studies of replacements for UI by new methodology of competitions during Islamic republic era (after the 1979 revolution);
   1.  Milad Tower- a closed competition; 1999-2008
   2. Abassabad City Center – several small competitions; 1980’s and 90s
3. Comparison of the two eras (before and after 1979 revolution) and the effect of political changes on the urban design and the urban imagery in Tehran.

Resilience of Dwellings and the Creation of Liveable Historical Residential Areas in China

There are numerous traditional residential buildings in China, but only in the last sixty years have academics studied historic dwellings. Currently, there are four metropolises, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, in mainland China, and with a number of unique traditional residential areas, such as Hutong, Linong, and Qilou. In 1928, due to Liang Sicheng’s contribution, the first Department of Architecture in China was established and Western theories of building conservation were introduced as well. However, due to the Chinese Cultural Revolution, preservation activities were interrupted in the 1950s. Also, beginning in the middle of the twentieth century, because of their ambition to develop the economy, Chinese elites attempted to expand their cities and transformed these places in response to the demands of urbanization.

Despite learning from the experiences of other countries, an effective and harmonious development situation has not yet been established in China. The application of preservation concepts began again in the 1980s by the government; however, most contemporary architectural scholars have no clear knowledge about modern conservation theories. Even the researchers who have roots in this field might not appropriately explain and apply these theories in practice. From 1997 to 2008, some residential areas were preserved and listed as World Heritage Sites, such as the Ancient City of Pingyao and the Old Town of Lijiang. All of these sites are located in rural or suburban areas. Comparatively, in urban areas, some inhabitants are suffering from poor living conditions in high-density neighbourhoods. Indeed, this has become a common phenomenon in China’s cities. Development of modern cities is a process of capital operation. If residents who live in these historic dwellings or inhabitants who are affected by the circumstances and sites of those old buildings do not pay attention to protection issues of the traditional dwellings, then our common culture and history will eventually be eroded. The significance of protection lies not simply in displaying these historic residences, but in continually using sustainable renovation methods, and maintaining their own characteristics. Moreover, in the developing process, because of shortage of issues of funding, housing property and ambitions from governments and capitalists, attention to inhabitants’ real lives in the remaining residences will not be seriously concerned.

Accordingly, in this research, answering how to support the sustainable development of traditional residential areas will include an overview of the history of heritage, dwellings, and neighbourhood preservation, its shifting values, goals, tools, and techniques, and their influence on preservation activities over the last sixty years in China. First, this study will make an argument about the specific implications of the theories, principles and values of preservation and their changes. It will also analyze case studies— mainly in Shanghai, Pingyao and Yangzhou — to record and classify different obstacles in preserving processes and the sustainable development of historical dwellings. With these steps, this study aims to strike a balance between the preservation of historic dwelling structures and recreating approaches for continuous use in order to benefit both the economic growth in cities and inhabitants’ lives in historical dwellings.

In the last 50 years, the discovered oil flow in China shaped the built environment (urban form and architecture) and lifestyle. Compared to other countries the Chinese petroleum landscape is particular, due to its political and historical issues. Before 1988, the entire Chinese petroleum industry was organized by the central government, the Petroleum Ministry, and local oil committee. Oilfields were discovered and petroleum chemical industries were launched according to the Zeitgeist: striving for national oil independence. In 1988, the Petroleum Ministry was reorganized by the China National Petroleum Corporation, China National Offshore Oil Corporation, and China Petroleum and Chemical Corporation. Chinese petroleumscapes were partly reshaped by market influence. Now, the central government and the major three corporations intertwined together to push the development of oil industry and influence the petroleumscape.

Firstly, this research explores the evolution of the physical presences of Chinese petroleumscapes from the following viewpoints: in which manner the Chinese petroleumscape evolved by the government intersecting oil industry, to which extent the Soviet urban planning ideas influenced the Chinese petroluemscape in 1960s, and how the petroleumscape transformed after the reorganization of the administrations. In the past 50 years, numerous physical presences of oil were constructed, such as oil industrial facilities including refinery factories, oil tanks, pipelines, etc; oil headquarters, research centres, industrial ancillary facilities including hospitals, museums, and open spaces etc; and retail facility-gas stations. These facilities were planned in the cluster around the oilfields or oil-ports for easy management and efficient work. This study argues the clusters as Petropolis, because they share the regional oil infrastructures and facilities even human resources. Before 1988 the settlements of the Petropolis shifted according to the national policies. After the reorganization of oil administration, the settlements were influenced by the national policies and market.

Secondly, this research examines the transformation of mental presences of Chinese petroleumscapes from the following aspects: to which extent the Chinese petroleum mental presence was organized, how the shift of administration influenced the mental presence, and what were the changes in lifestyle. In the 1960s and 1970s, the mental presence of the Chinese petroleumscape was mainly imaginative, to promote Daqing as a study model for all Chinese industrial cities and evoke national striving for industrial development. Central government and local committees commissioned numerous artists to create paintings and photographs with the images of dedicated oil worker models or the panorama of the oil industry. These images were drawn on the walls, cited in books, and even printed on the daily commodities. After the reorganization, the mental presence tended to become more similar to other countries. The three major corporations are presented on signboards, TV shows, etc.

Planning historians explore urban structures, cultural historians study the actuality of oil, and historians of the built environment examine the regional oil influence and oil's physical presence. This research will explore these views in context.