Between Landscape, Society and Culture – learning from a 65-year-old Greek architectural and urbanism studio.

The lecture is going to focus on the multifaceted role of architecture and architects in an era of multiple crisis and uncertainty (Climate crisis, Covid-19 etc.). Based on the experience and work of the Athens based architectural and urbanism studio Thymio Papayannis and Associates (TPA), we will try to respond to ACC Lecture’s critical question [what are the reasons to love and hate architecture?] by examining the links of architecture with history, landscape, cultural and societal characteristics. Through TPAs experience and concentrating in cases from Greece we will see how architecture, landscape design and urbanism function as a means of transformation and change. The role of architects in cultural, landscape and environmental protection, the importance of co-designing and collaborating with local stakeholders and civil society, the difficulties that arise in this process of transformation. Particular attention will be given to projects that reflect TPAs work in the fields of environmental protection, landscape design and heritage protection. Finally, we will reflect on how architectural practice has evolved this last decade an what are the contemporary challenges. 

About Dimitris Poulios

Dimitris Poulios was born in 1984 in Volos, Greece. He graduated from the School of Architecture at the University of Thessaly in Volos in 2010, and continued his postgraduate studies in the field of Urban Design in Cardiff University (UK) with scholarship from the Bodossaki Foundation. His scientific and professional interests lie in the field of Urban Design, Urban Planning, Urban Policy and Community Participation. In 2021 he concluded his PhD in the field of Urban Planning in the National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) as a scholar of the Onassis Foundation. He has won many Architectural and Urban Planning competitions and has experience working in Greece and abroad (UK, Albania, Cyprus, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Qatar etc). In 2013 he joined Thymio Papayannis and Associates (TPA) working in several projects as an Urban Planner, Urban Designer and Project Manager, and became partner in the firm in 2019. Since 2022 he is also Visiting Professor in Department of Architecture in the University of Thessaly in Greece.