Masterplanning the Adaptive City

Groundlab, London, Beijing
Groundlab is a Landscape Urbanism practice led by Eva Castro, Holger Kehne,
Alfredo Ramirez, Eduardo Rico, and Sarah Majid. Comprised of a multidisciplinary
team of architects, urban designers, engineers and landscape architects,
Groundlab brings together diverse expertise as a response to contemporary 
social, economic, and environmental and infrastructural conditions. The studio
approaches cities and landscapes as natural processes in constant change and
evolution, thereby requiring flexible and adaptable mechanisms for the design of
future urban environments. Groundlab emphasizes the analysis of existing and
potential contextual conditions, and the temporal and dynamical forces which
shape cities. 
Group8, Geneva
Founded in 2000, and consisting of nine partners and a team comprising seventy
employees, Group8 is an architectural firm whose R&D priorities are the
generation of specific configurations that best fit the context, the program, and 
the social and environmental framework of a project. In 2007 the firm created its
branch Group8asia, based in Hanoi, Vietnam. In 2010, the office was nominated 
for the Distinction Romande d’Architecture. Integration of economic and
environmental performance, and a cultural added value within each project is
derived from Group8’s workshop culture and teamwork at both a local and
international level.
Hong Kong Parametric Design Association, Hong Kong
The foundation of HKPDA forms a bridge between academic research, teaching,
and practice, through research on parametric design methodologies integrating
technology and design. Led by Sam Cho, Yang Wang, Ben Dai, and Jaenes Bong,
the group was formed by an association of professors, researchers, architects,
students, programmers, etc. as an umbrella organization for the sharing and
dissemination of ideas, skills, and knowledge. The aim of the group is to inspire
and enable a future generation of designers to be equipped with parametric
capacities so that they can turn imagination into reality.
James Corner Field Operations, New York
James Corner Field Operations is an urban design and landscape architecture
practice focussing on design projects across a variety of high-profile project types
and scales, from large urban districts and complex postindustrial sites, to small,
well-crafted, detail design projects. The practice makes a special commitment to
the design of a vibrant and dynamic public realm, informed by the ecology of both
people and nature. As a team with cross-disciplinary backgrounds in landscape
architecture, urban design, architecture, and communication art, JCFO aims to
craft ecologically smart and culturally significant built works of lasting distinction.
JCFO has won numerous awards and their work has been published and exhibited
internationally.
Kaisersrot, Zurich
Kaisersrot is a collaboration of architects and researchers in the field of
architecture, urban design, and information technology. Kaisersrot became a 
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start-up company in 2008. The urban design projects of Kaisersrot highlight the
dialectic opposition of top-down and bottom-up processes and systems, and the
group aims to combine both strategies, oscillating between control and laissez
faire. The work of Kaisersrot consists of independent projects and collaborations
with other architectural offices, including recent collaborations with Herzog & de
Meuron, Sauerbruch Hutton, and KCAP.
MAD, Beijing, Tokyo
MAD was founded in 2004 by Ma Yansong and is led by Ma Yansong, Dang Qun,
and Yosuke Hayano. The office received worldwide attention in 2006 with the
winning competition entry for a residential tower near Toronto, now nearly
completed. MAD’s projects, from residential complexes or offices to cultural
centres, conceive future-oriented environments based on a contemporary
interpretation of the eastern spirit of nature. Recent and current projects are
located in cities around China, in Italy, France, and Canada. MAD has been
awarded the Young Architecture Award from the New York Institute of Architects
(2006) and the RIBA international fellowship (2011).
OCEAN CN Consultancy Network, Hong Kong (HQ), Beijing, Shanghai, 
London OCEAN CN, led by Tom Verebes, Gao Yan, and Felix Robbins, is a 
network of specialist design consultants based in Hong Kong, with partners in
Beijing, Shanghai, and London. OCEAN CN collaborates as an integrated team of
experts, amalgamated from architecture, urbanism, engineering, computational
design, and manufacturing, visualization and information communication. 
OCEAN CN’s multidisciplinary, experimental approach aims to innovate upon
standard systems and methodologies, with masterplanning, urban design,
architectural and interiors projects, in Asia, Europe and North America. The office
has been widely published and has exhibited in some of the world’s most
prestigious venues.
Plasma Studio, London, Beijing, Bolzano
Led by Eva Castro, Holger Kehne, and Ulla Hell, Plasma Studio is an architecture
and design practice with a portfolio of work across Europe and Asia. Plasma, in
Classical Greek, means modeling, form, fabric, imagination, and fiction. In physics
the plasma state is a unique condition of matter arising as the result of a complex
overlay of external forces. Plasma Studio negotiates the nature of flows, events,
and ephemera, with the rational, structural, and systemic parameters of material
organization. Focussing on all scales of design, from furniture and installations to
urbanism and masterplanning, Plasma’s approach to tectonics sets spaces,
planes, and bodies in unforeseen relationships that challenge conventional
topographies and spatial codes.
Rocker-Lange Architects, Hong Kong, Boston
Rocker-Lange Architects practices architecture through designing, building,
researching, writing, and teaching. Founded in 2005 by partners Ingeborg M.
Rocker and Christian J. Lange, the office specializes in installations, urban
interventions, and cultural and residential projects. Projects are developed through
intensive research in conjunction with the use of innovative digital design
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