Getting Lost in Buildings

Our increasingly complex cities contain increasingly complex buildings and navigating these can be a miserable and frustrating experience. To address how we can build better buildings, this event brings neuroscientists, architects, and designers together to discuss how the neuroscience of mental mapping can helpfully inform architects and sign designers.

It arises from a joint collaboration between The Academy of Neuroscience for Architecture (ANFA), The Royal Institute of Navigation (RIN), The Society for Experiential Graphic Design (SEGD), and The Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL. Taking place at UCL’s Here East campus at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and online, this one-day event comprises talks from a variety of academics and practitioners, and panel/audience discussion, followed by a social event. Open to anyone with a professional interest in mental mapping of buildings.

The event will also be streamed on Zoom.

Please note: If you are registering to attend in person and you have accessibility requirements, please get in touch with the organisers before the event.

Schedule

9.15 - Registration and tea/coffee        

9.45 - Introduction & welcome

10.00 - Michal Gath-Morad

10.30 - Klaus Gramann

11.00 - Refreshments and Posters 

11.30 - Tom Lloyd  

12.00 - Lara Gregorians

12.30 - Sam McElhinney

13.00 - Lunch                           

14.00 - Flash talks

15.00 - Natasha Reid

15.30 - Refreshments and Posters 

16.00 - Matthias Gruber

16.30 - Panel/audience discussion

Please note schedule and speakers subject to change. 

Speaker Biographies

Dr Michal Gath Morad is an Assistant Professor at University of Cambridge’s Department of Architecture, where she directs Cambridge Cognitive Architecture. She is an architect holding a PhD in cognitive science, seeking to quantify how architecture impacts spatial cognition, translating behavioural findings into evidence-based design tools, and analysing how the use of evidence influences design cognition.

Klaus Gramann received his Ph.D. in psychology from RWTH Aachen, Aachen, Germany. He was a postdoc with the LMU Munich, Germany, and the Swartz Center for Computational Neuroscience, University of California at San Diego. After working as a visiting professor at the National Chiao Tung University, Hsinchu, Taiwan he became the chair of Biopsychology and Neuroergonomics with the Technical University of Berlin, Germany in 2012. He has been a Professor with the University of Technology Sydney, Australia and is an International Scholar at the University of California San Diego. His research covers the neural foundations of cognitive processes with a focus on the brain dynamics of embodied cognitive processes. He directs the Berlin Mobile Brain/Body Imaging Labs (BeMoBIL) that focus on imaging human brain dynamics in actively behaving participants.

Tom Lloyd is co-founder of Pearson Lloyd. He trained in Furniture Design at Trent Polytecthnic, before completing a Master’s in industrial design at the RCA in 1993. Tom founded Pearson Lloyd with Luke Pearson in 1997. Tom’s particular interest lies in design’s role in society and has a strong focus on strengthening Pearson Lloyd’s circularity practice. Since 1997, Pearson Lloyd has established a cross-sector position built on insights from the social, economic, and environmental challenges facing people at home, work and on the move. In 2023, Pearson Lloyd were awarded 'Designer of the year' by Dezeen. Tom was Master of the Faculty of Royal Designers for Industry from 2021 to 2023, and in 2022 was awarded an Honorary Doctor of Design by Nottingham Trent University. 

Lara Gregorians is a Postdoctoral Researcher in the Architectural Cognition in Practice group within Future Cities Lab Global, at the Singapore-ETH Centre. She holds a PhD in Neuroarchitecture from the Spatial Cognition Lab within the Institute of Behavioural Neuroscience at UCL, and a Master’s in Health, Wellbeing and Sustainable Buildings from the Bartlett, UCL. Her work centres on understanding how the built environment impacts human behaviour, perception and cognition.

Sam McElhinney is an Architect and Associate Professor at the Canterbury School of Architecture and Design, where he runs the Architecture degrees. He is also the founder of isovists.org, which hosts a free multi-platform spatial analysis software. Sam’s research involves the development of realtime analytic models that aid our understanding of our understanding of space; as well as more than a passing obsession with the mythological structures of labyrinths and mazes.

Natasha Reid is founder of MATTER SPACE SOUL, a progressive spatial design lab and consultancy shaping places for health, wellbeing and social sustainability. After practicing in architecture and urban design at award-winning studios, she specialised in innovating new approaches at the intersection of design, human sciences and the arts since 2013. She created the experience-led Place Quality Model, shortlisted for an RTPI Planning Excellence Award, and subject of an academic study funded by National Institute for Health and Care Research.  She is a Fellow with the Center for Conscious Design, and co-director of Considerate Urbanism; a movement for more human-kind futures. 

Dr Matthias Gruber is a Sir Henry Dale Fellow funded by Wellcome and the Head of the Motivation and Memory Group at the Cardiff University Brain Research Imaging Centre (CUBRIC). His research focuses on the cognitive and neural mechanisms underlying curiosity, and how curiosity affects learning, information seeking, exploration, and memory.

More information

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