Kathy Velikov

Kathy Velikov is Professor and Associate Dean for Research and Creative Practice at the University of Michigan Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning. Kathy is a leader in practice-based design research and education, advancing environmentally responsive, technologically enabled, and climate positive built environments through speculation, prototyping, and visualization for responsive architectural material assemblies, resilient multifunctional urban infrastructures, and territorial practices for decarbonization. She is a licensed architect, founding partner of the research-based practice RVTR, and former president of the Association for Computer Aided Design in Architecture (ACADIA).

Kathy’s projects have been exhibited nationally and internationally and have received multiple awards. She has published two books – Ambiguous Territory: Architecture, Landscape, and the Postnatural (Actar, 2022) and Infra Eco Logi Urbanism (Park Books, 2015) – and her work and writing has been published in numerous journals and book chapters. Honors include the ACADIA Society Award for Leadership (2023), an ACSA/AIA Housing Design Education Award (2020), the Technology + Architecture Design (TAD) Journal Research Contribution Award (2020), two R&D Awards from Architecture Magazine (2010, 2016), a Journal of Architectural Education Best Design as Research Article (2013), the Architizer A+ Award Program’s Architecture + Sound Jury Award (2013), the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture Faculty Design Award (2012, 2014), a Royal Architectural Institute of Canada Award of Excellence for Innovation in the Practice of Architecture (2011), the Canadian Professional Prix de Rome (2009), the Architectural League of New York’s Young Architect’s Forum Award (2008), and the Oberdick Fellowship at Taubman College (2006-07). Her academic research has been funded by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory, National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Transportation, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the National Research Council of Canada, the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Ontario Power Authority, Guardian Industries, and Ford Motor Company.

She received her professional degree from the University of Waterloo, and her master’s from the University of Toronto. Prior to Taubman College, Kathy practiced professionally for over a decade, gaining expertise in institutional buildings, housing, and urban masterplans. RVTR, her research-based practice co-founded with partner Geoffrey Thün, serves as a lab for exploration and experimentation in the intertwinements between architecture, the environment, technology, and sociopolitics.

At Taubman College, Kathy teaches Architecture design studio, thesis, ecology and technology seminars, and in the Master of Science in Digital and Material Technologies.