Welcome to srpLAB
Established in 2006 by Santiago R. Perez, srpLAB is focused on rethinking Design + Making in the 21st century, with an interdisciplinary approach towards Architecture and Design.
srpLAB is an interdisciplinary design collaborative promoting research and discovery through MAKING. The confluence of emerging fabrication technologies, generative modeling and interactive architecture, forms the core of our research. The development of new modes of practice linking these forms of experimentation with Environmentally Innovative Strategies for Design & Fabrication, informs our teaching, research and practice.
Santiago R. Pérez, is the 21st Century ChairAssistant Professor of Integrated Practice at the University of Arkansas, Fay Jones School of Architecture, developing new initiatives related to “Craft + Advanced Digital Fabrication in Architecture.”
Pérez received a Master of Architecture with Distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Design in 1991. As a recipient of the Tamaki Fellowship, he was a researcher in residence in the office of Tadao Ando in Osaka, and the AMORPHE office in Tokyo, headed by Kiyoshi Sey Takeyama.
Pérez combines his passion and training as an architect, with his steadily emerging talents as a Digital Craft innovator and educator, combining advanced digital fabrication and computation with traditional craft practices, towards a confluence of the hand and technology that he has termed “FABCRAFT.” Working with his students to realize large-scale, complex material assemblies, Pérez is developing new ways of fabricating architecture with emrging technologies and materials.
As an emerging experimental architect, Pérez has developed installations and work striving to combine the teachings of his early mentor, Tadao Ando, with the more recent inspiration derived by his collaboration and teaching with architect and digital pioneer, William Massie. Pérez is devoting his research through making, towards a critical questioning of technology, actively seeking to find more relevant and thoughtful applications of Craft + Advanced Fabrication in the pursuit of architecture.
As an invited panelist and lecturer, Pérez contributes to the development of critical practice and thinking with respect to FABCRAFT. A partial list of recent invited lectures and panel discussions includes:
Fabcraft: Crafting the Future with Digital Fabrication Lecture : Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock, Jan. 17, 2012
High Performance Craft Symposium Panelist: University of Washington College of Built Environments May, 2011
The Digital Imagination: Art, Design & Computing Lecture: University of Oregon’s Distinguished Speakers Series 2009
DESIGN LIFE NOW: NATIONAL DESIGN TRIENNIAL Panelist: Contemporary Arts Center Houston, 2008
The development of an ethic based in learning through direct engagement with material practice has been one of the primary endeavors in his installed work, as both an educator and innovator. recent installations include:
FabCraft Computational Design + Fabrication Exhibit sUgAR gallery, Bentonville AR 2011
MicroLiving Pavilions: Full-Scale Fabricated Prototypes Lawndale Arts Center, Houston, Texas 2009 in collaboration with William Massie
Buffalo Bayou BentWood Cloud Installation Houston, Texas 2008
Pérez has published and lectured widely on the relation between craft and digital fabrication. His most recent publication is titled Towards an Ecology of Making published in-
MATTER: MATERIAL PROCESSES IN ARCHITECTURAL PRODUCTION.
His essay titled Cardboard: Structural and Material Innovation in Architecture has been published in OUTSIDE THE BOX: CARDBOARD DESIGN NOW.
Pérez regularly publishes his research trough making in peer reviewed journals, most notably as a frequent contributor to the ACADIA conference proceedings. Pérez has established srpLAB [www.srplab.net], an interdisciplinary design practice promoting research and discovery through MAKING. The confluence of emerging fabrication technologies, computational strategies and CRAFT, form the core of this research. The development of new modes of practice linking these forms of experimentation with Environmentally Innovative Strategies for Design & Fabrication, informs srpLAB’s ongoing initiatives.