Newcastle University

Introduction

Adam Sharr is Professor of Architecture at Newcastle University; Principal of Adam Sharr Architects; Editor of arq: Architectural Research Quarterly (Cambridge University Press' architecture journal, co-edited with Richard Weston); and Series Editor of Thinkers for Architects, published by Routledge. He is leader of the school's 'Design Office' design research consultancy. Before coming to Newcastle, he worked at the Welsh School of Architecture, Cardiff University, and Nottingham University, having previously practiced with Wright and Wright Architects, Dean Hawkes and the conservation practice Carden and Godfrey.

Qualifications

BSc (Hons.), BArch (Dist.), Ph.D, ARB, RIBA

Previous Positions

Welsh School of Architecture, Cardiff University
Nottingham University

Memberships

Architects Registration Board
Royal Institute of British Architects

Research Interests

My interests include: how architecture embodies the values of the individuals and the cultures who have inhabited, procured, designed and built it; shifting relations between theory and practice in architecture; practice-based and practice-led research in architecture; architecture, memory, heritage and conservation; ideas of quality, taste, expertise and 'the everyday'; phenomenology; postcolonialism; and post-war British Architectural History (especially design methods, typology and the science of land use and form).

Other Expertise

I have practice expertise in the design of houses and housing; library and learning spaces and; in architectural conservation. My practice portfolio includes houses for private clients completed in the Oberschwaben, Germany (2009) and in mid-Wales (2006). Other projects include house extensions and a field study centre in mid-Wales. The practice is currently involved with repairs and alterations to a Grade 2 listed house in the Cotswolds and a house in Co. Donegal. The practice portfolio is online at www.adamsharr.com

Current Work

I am editor of the ‘best-selling’ book series Thinkers for Architects published by Routledge, shortlisted for the RIBA Presidents’ Medals for Outstanding University Located Research in 2008. The series aims to outline what particular theorists and philosophers have to offer for architects, locate their architectural thinking in the context of their work, introduce significant texts, and point architects toward significant insights for design. The series has been translated into Korean and translations into Turkish and Spanish are forthcoming. My own book in the series, Heidegger for Architects (2007), deals with the philosopher’s work on place and dwelling, and with questions of authenticity and provincialism raised by his work.

That book draws from my previous book Heidegger’s Hut (MIT Press, 2006), which examined how the thinker’s work emerged from his mountain retreat at Todtnauberg. Heidegger’s Hut has been reviewed widely, in New York Times, Los Angeles Times, TLS, Bookforum, Cultural Politics, Chronicle of Higher Education (US), Journal of Architectural Education and Architectural Record. It is also translated into Spanish (Gustavo Gili, 2008) and German (Brinkmann and Bose, 2010).

I am the co-editor of two books which have emerged from conferences I co-organised. Quality Out of Control: Standards for Measuring Architecture, with Allison Dutoit and Juliet Odgers, was published by Routledge in 2010, examining the widespread disagreement about what quality in architecture is, and how it might be measured and achieved. In 2006, Primitive: Original Matters in Architecture, with Juliet Odgers and Flora Samuel, was published, also by Routledge.

Future Research

With colleagues in Newcastle, I am setting up a Design Office to pursue practice-based and practice-led architectural research.

I'm also engaged in two book projects:

• Architecture and Culture. An edited collection of essays aimed at consolidating a distinctive strand of architectural research, reading buildings and their details as artifacts of the cultures in which they were inhabited, procured, designed and built. To be published by Routledge, 2012. Contributors include David Leatherbarrow, Marco Frascari, Jane Rendell, Jonathan Hill, Michael Cadwell, George Dodds, Flora Samuel and Diana Periton.

• Demolishing Whitehall: Harold Wilson, Leslie Martin and the Architecture of White Heat. An interdisciplinary architecture, politics and history book - co-written with Stephen Thornton, Politics, Cardiff University - about Leslie Martin’s 1965 scheme to rebuild Whitehall. Two years after Harold Wilson’s ‘white heat of technology’ speech and three years before the ‘evenements’ of 1968, Martin’s proposal displays the particular priorities of its time: technological, utopian, socialist and institutional. The book examines the Whitehall project as a distinctive manifestation of Wilson's Britain, in which technology was claimed for the socialist project as an instrument of popular salvation. We have a contract with Ashgate and the book will be published in 2012.

Postgraduate Supervision

• Edward Wainwright, PhD, AHRC funded: Transparency and Obfuscation: Norman Foster, Henri Lefevbre and the Politics of Modern Architecture (graduated 2011)
• Samuel Austin, PhD, AHRC funded: Transience and Non-Place: The British Motorway Service Station
• Mhiari McVicar, PhD: Precision in Architectural Practice
• Tom Brigden, PhD, AHRC funded: A Strategic View: The Origins, Uses and Abuses of the Protected Vista
• Marga Munar Bauza, PhD, The Complexity of Urban Boundaries
• Rob Stevens, MPhil, Alternative Cartographies and Narratives of Urban Wandering
• Chris Wilkins, MPhil, The Everyday Detail: Architecture, Taste and Experience
• Yun Dai, Architectural Heritage in China (with John Pendlebury)

I welcome PhD and MPhil applicants and would be delighted to discuss projects related to my research, or in architecture and architectural culture more broadly.

Other roles and responsibilities

• Editor, with Richard Weston, arq (Architectural Research Quarterly, published by Cambridge University Press), 2009-date (Associate Editor of arq 2004-2009)
• Series Editor: Thinkers for Architects, published by Routledge. 2006-date
• Editorial Board Member: Critical Studies in Architecture Series, published by Routledge.
• Editor: (and Founding Editor), made (Materials: Architecture Design Environment, published by the Welsh School of Architecture), 2004-2009
• Invited International Lectures: University of La Coruña, Spain (2009); Virginia Tech, USA (guest speaker at Virginia Tech conference Constructing Imagination) (2010), Université de Montreal, Canada (2010).
• Founder Member and Steering Group Member, AHRA (Architectural Humantities Research Association), 2004-date
• Awards Assessor: RIBA Presidents’ Medals Dissertation Prizes, 2005; RIBA Awards, Wales, 2009.
• External Examiner: MSc in Architecture, University of Ulster 2009-2011.
• External Examiner: MA in Architectural History, Bartlett, UCL, 2011-2013.
  
• External Examiner: PhD: Bartlett, UCL (2007, 2011); University of Edinburgh (2008, 2009); University of Sheffield (2009)
• Invited Design Critic/Invited Lecturer: Universities of: Cambridge; Bath; Liverpool; Nottingham; London Metropolitan; West of England.

Honours and Awards

2008: Thinkers for Architects, Shortlisted RIBA President’s Award for Outstanding University Located Research
2007: Heidegger’s Hut, Winner: Scholarly Illustrated Category, American Association of University Presses Book, Journal and Jacket Show.
2006: New House at Llethr, Llysdinam, Newbridge-on-Wye, Shortlisted RIBA Awards
1995: Joint First Prize, SPAB Philip Webb Award

• Sharr A, Thornton S. Demolishing Whitehall: Harold Wilson, Leslie Martin and the Architecture of White Heat. London: Ashgate, 2012.
• Sharr A. Mildendo and Masdar, A Tale of Two Cities. In: Adler G., Brittain-Catlin T. and Fontana-Giusti G, ed. Scale: Imagination, Perception and Practice in Architecture. London: Routledge, 2012. Submitted.
• Sharr A, ed. Reading Architecture and Culture: Researching Buildings, Spaces and Documents. London: Routledge, 2012.
• Sharr A. Burning Bruder Klaus: Towards an Architecture of Slipstream. In: Armitage, J, ed. Virilio Now: Current Perspectives in Virilio Studies. London: Polity, 2011.
• Sharr A. Heidegger's Huette. Berlin, Germany: Brinkmann & Bose, 2010.
• Sharr A, Dutoit A. Landscapes of Experience: An Interview with Adam Caruso. In:Dutoit, A., Odgers, J., Sharr, A., ed. Quality Out of Control: Standards for Measuring Architecture.London:Routledge,2010, pp. chapter 1.
• Sharr A. Leslie Martin and the Science of Architectural Form. In:Dutoit, A., Odgers, Ju., Sharr, A., ed. Quality Out of Control: Standards for Measuring Architecture.London:Routledge,2010, pp. chapter 6.
• Dutoit A, Odgers J, Sharr A, ed. Quality Out of Control: Standards for Measuring Architecture. London:Routledge,2010.
• Sharr A. Selective Memory: Contesting Architecture and Urbanism and Potsdam's Stadtschloss and Alter Markt. German Life and Letters 2010,63 4 398-416.
• Sharr A. The Sedimentation of Memory. Journal of Architecture 2010,15 4 499-515.
• Sharr A. Drawing in Good Faith. Architectural Theory Review 2009,14 3 306-321.
• Sharr A. La Cabana de Heidegger. Barcelona:GG,2008.
• Sharr A. Building to Think about Dwelling: A New House in the Wye Valley. In:Temple, N., Bandyophay, S., ed. Thinking Practice: Reflections on Architectural Research and Building Work.London:Black Dog,2007, pp. chapter 9.
• Sharr A. Heidegger for Architects. London:Routledge,2007.
• Sharr A, Forster W, Coombs S. A Plywood Soane. made 2006,3 90-91.
• Sharr A. Primitive and the Everyday: Sergison Bates, Lefebvre and the Guilt of Architectural Expertise. In:Odgers, Juliet; Samuel, Flora; Sharr, Adam, ed. Primitive: Original Matters in Architecture.London:Routledge,2006, pp. 240-250.
• Odgers J, Samuel F, Sharr A, ed. Primitive: Original Matters in Architecture. London:Routledge,2006.
• Sharr A. Pigeons, Angels and Problems of Taste. made 2004,1 72-73.
• Wood A, Samant S, Sassi P, Sharr A. 'Where Will We Put Them All?' Practical Strategies for Dealing with Increasing Student Numbers in Architectural Education. In: Proceedings: International Conference on Building Education and Research.2003,Salford:University of Salford
• Sharr A. Can Architecture Lie?. Architectural Theory Review 2003,8 2 162-170.
• Sharr A. The Professor's House: Martin Heidegger's House at Freiburg-im-Breisgau. In:Sarah Menin, ed. Constructing Place.London:Routledge,2003, pp. 130-142.
• Sharr A, Sassi P, Heath T, ed. Green Houses: Catalogue of an Exhibition at the Earth Centre, Conisbrough. Nottingham:University of Nottingham,2002.
• Sharr A, Unwin S. Heidegger's Hut. arq: Architectural Research Quarterly 2001,5 1 53-61.