“Outstanding research” of Manchester lecturer wins top award

21 Oct 2010 - A senior lecturer from The University of Manchester has been given a prestigious award by the Royal Institute of British Architects for her anthropological research of architecture. Dr Albena Yaneva, who has recently been appointed Co-Director of The Manchester Architecture Research Centre (MARC), was awarded the RIBA President's award for outstanding university-located research for her study, An Ethnography of Architecture . Dr Yaneva's work explores the process of architectural design and investigates how new buildings emerge and how they change cultures and societies. The findings are based on ethnographic observation and interviews at the Rotterdam based Office for Metropolitan Architecture , run by Rem Koolhaas. She also used photo documentation on projects, archival materials and press clippings documenting the design of different OMA buildings. The project results have been published in the form of two single-authored monographs. Part of the School of Environment and Development and the Manchester School of Architecture, MARC researches how design, together with and socio-economic processes shape cities.