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In 2007 the Laboratory for Visionary Architecture LAVA was set up as a network of creative minds with a research and design focus. It aims to reposition architecture at the forefront of cultural, technological and social change. The office operates as an international network of specialists with offices in Sydney, Beijing, Stuttgart, Berlin and Riyadh.

Directors Tobias Wallisser and Alexander Rieck are based in Stuttgart and Chris Bosse [|Chris Bosse] is based in Sydney; each is actively engaged in research, guest lecturing and teaching. Design is led by a rigorous research agenda that dissolves the boundaries between Man, Nature and Technology.

Collaborations with international research centres, technology laboratories and sustainability specialists underpin the practice.

Their goal is to push the boundaries of architecture with digital and experimental formfinding, and implement virtual environments into architecture. LAVA’s vision is how to achieve more with less. Their work combines ‘digital workflow, nature’s principles and the latest digital fabrication technologies’ to achieve ‘MORE WITH LESS: more (architecture) with less (material/ energy/time/cost)’.

For LAVA ‘Green is the new black’. Using the latest advances in computing and building technology LAVA want to reposition the role of man in the natural environment. They explore frontiers that merge future technologies with the patterns of organisation found in nature and believe this will result in a smarter, friendlier, more socially and environmentally responsible future. Nature is the inspiration for LAVA – it holds all the answers. They cite as examples the tree that filters the air, filters water, produces oxygen, and is self-generating. It carries leaves and fruit, a multiple of its own structural weight. And a coral reef where thousands of species thrive in coexistence of each other and the elements, air, water and sun. This potential for naturally evolving systems to create new building typologies and structures underpins LAVA’s projects across the globe.

The lessons from nature are in three main areas: structure, material and building skin. LAVA projects such as Tower Skin, Snowflake Tower and Bionic Tower feature intelligent systems and skins that respond to air pressure, temperature, humidity, solar-radiation and pollution. Sustainable structures use the very same energy that is abundant in nature. LAVA uses computation to simulate this natural behaviour of growth and adaptation of species. It is often misunderstood as superficial mimicry, but the potential is in understanding the principles behind nature, not only the appearance.

Over the last few years LAVA has designed master plans for universities; installations such as the lycra Green Void and the set for the globally televised MTV Award ; winning competition design for the city centre of the CO2-free city Masdar in Abu Dhabi ; sports facilities ;the ‘reskinning’ of an aging 60s icon, the UTS building in Sydney ; furniture including the Sherman Bibliotecha and a light for Wallpaper* magazine; the revisioning of a youth hostel in Germany ; a Future Hotel showcase ; an emergency shelter; globetrotting digital origami tigers ; and a classroom and home of the future.

Awards include the Australian Interior Design Award, UN partnered ZEROprize Re-Skinning Award , I. D. Annual Design Review, IDEA Award , AAFAB AA London, Cityscape Dubai Award Sustainability ; commendations include Well Tech Award Italy and Dedalo Minosse International Prize.