Lars Gräbner

Associate Professor of Practice in Architecture
Teaching Areas
Architectural Design, Construction
Connect
Office: 1223B

Lars Gräbner, an associate professor of practice in architecture at the University of Michigan’s Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning, teaches architecture, urban design, and advanced construction methods. In 2004, he co-founded VolumeOne Design Studio, an architectural practice based in Detroit and Berlin, with Gerrit Grigoleit. Gräbner focuses on urban design and innovative housing in various scales, exploring the built environment under social considerations and the advancement of building performance, especially in sustainable aspects.

A licensed architect, Gräbner, through his practice at VolumeOne, specializes in residential and public projects with urban design challenges. His focus is an interdisciplinary approach to projects, where he involves specialists from various fields. Among his projects were a commissioned residence in northern Germany and a villa in Mallorca, Spain. With the successful competition submission for the Anhui Province Acrobatic Center in March 2011, Gräbner expanded his international practice to China, where he contributes to larger urban design projects and signature buildings.

Prior to that, Gräbner had gained experience in urban design, project development, and construction documentation in several architectural offices since 1995, when he was lead designer and project architect for many residential, public, and urban projects. Beginning with the successful competition for the extension to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, Gräbner had been the lead designer for some 25 projects at Studio Daniel Libeskind, an international architectural firm, then based in Berlin. The projects ranged from scenography and exhibitions, to theaters, museums, and large urban design projects.

Gräbner has been involved in a research project on didactics with Professor Marc Angélil and on urban morphology with Professor Franz Oswald, both at ETH Zurich. Currently, he is collaborating with Taubman College’s Harry Giles on an interdisciplinary research project on medium-rise, high-density modular housing. Gräbner conducts research on Detroit, and contributed to Mapping Detroit: Land, Community, and Shaping a City (Wayne State University Press, 2015).

Gräbner studied architecture in Berlin and Hannover, Germany, and Copenhagen. He received his professional degree at the Universität Hannover and was awarded the 1996 ‘Preis der Universität Hannover’ for Outstanding Work at the Department of Architecture.

Projects

Architecture, Aug 22, 2024
Architecture, Aug 22, 2024
The The Osi Art Apartments at West End will be one key node of the ‘WEST END GALLERY DISTRICT,’ a UNESCO Neighborhood City of Design partner, envisioned as a local […]

Courses

ARCH 507, Section 1
Winter 2025
Instructors: Lars Gräbner
ARCH 562, Section 1
Winter 2025
Instructors: Sharon Haar, Craig Borum, Gabriel Cuéllar, Lars Gräbner, Claudia Wigger, Kit McCullough, Laura Marie Peterson, Adam Smith, Christina Hansen
ARCH 509, Section 2
Fall 2024
Instructors: Lars Gräbner
ARCH 672, Section 1
Fall 2024
Instructors: Perry Kulper, María Arquero de Alarcón, El Hadi Jazairy, Ryan Ball, Claudia Wigger, Lars Gräbner, Geoffrey Thün, Jose Sanchez
ARCH 507, Section 3
Winter 2021
Instructors: Lars Gräbner
ARCH 672
Fall 2021
Instructors: Lars Gräbner, Ellie Abrons, Craig Borum, Christina Hansen, Kit McCullough, Meredith Miller, Claudia Wigger
ARCH 507
Winter 2022
Instructors: Lars Gräbner
ARCH 562
Winter 2023
Instructors: Sharon Haar, Craig Borum, Lars Gräbner, Christina Hansen, Kit McCullough, Adam Miller, Laura Marie Peterson, Jonathan Rule, Kathy Velikov, Claudia Wigger
ARCH 672, Section 1
Fall 2023
Instructors: Lars Gräbner, Christina Hansen, María Arquero de Alarcón, Anya Sirota, Claudia Wigger, El Hadi Jazairy, Sharon Haar, Michael Kennedy, Perry Kulper, Stratton Coffman, Laura Marie Peterson

Books

Book, Mar 1, 2015