Hyojin Kwon

Hyojin Kwon

Hyojin Kwon is an Assistant Professor in Architecture at the Georgia Institute of Technology's School of Architecture. She is also the founding partner of Pre- and Post-, a research-oriented design practice based in Boston and Seoul. Her recent research, teaching, and projects explore how digital media transforms not only the internal methodologies of the design fields but also broader cultural, environmental, philosophical, and socio-political contexts. She focuses particularly on the reciprocal relationship between digital media and physical artifacts shaping contemporary urbanism.

Kwon has previously taught at Harvard, Yale, and the University of Pennsylvania and has received prestigious awards such as the Irving Innovation Fellowship at the Harvard GSD, the MacDowell Residency, the ArtOmi Architecture Residency, and the Research Residency at the Autodesk Technology Center in Boston. She has given lectures and served on juries at several institutions, including Harvard, Yale, Penn, MIT, RISD, Sci-Arc, and UT Austin.

Previously, Kwon has completed installation projects for the Museum of Brisbane, Brisbane City Council in Australia, Tokyo Designers Week in Japan, CICA Museum, Seoul Foundation for Arts and Culture, and Hanyang Artainer Museum in Korea. Her design work has been featured in solo and group exhibitions in Cambridge, Seoul, Brisbane, and Sydney. Prior to founding Pre- and Post-, she practiced in several offices in the United States and Australia, including Populous, OMA, SOM, MILLIØNS, and Certain Measures.

Kwon received a Master in Architecture from the Harvard Graduate School of Design, where she was awarded the James Templeton Kelley Prize for her thesis titled Death, Divorce, Down-sizing, Dislocation, and (Now) Display: A Self-Storage Center for a More Exhibitionist Future.

Assistant Professor
Phone
(404) 894-4885
Office
Arch West 356
University, College, and School/Department

Paula Gomez

Paula Gomez headshot
paula.gomez@gtri.gatech.edu

Dr. Paula Gómez is a Principal Research Engineer at Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI), where she leads Systems Modeling efforts within the CIPHER Lab’s Resilient Infrastructure and Supply Chain Unit. An architect and systems researcher, she has led multidisciplinary projects spanning resilient infrastructure, spatiotemporal modeling, and systems engineering, including key roles on the DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative (QBI) and the Gates Foundation’s G2RT program. A Fulbright Scholar with a Ph.D. in Computational Design and an M.S in Building Technologies from Georgia Tech, as well as a Professional Architecture License (Chile) and a Architecture and Systems Engineering Certificate from MIT, her work has received multiple international and GTRI awards. As President of SIGraDi and an active contributor to leading international scientific organizations, she advances global collaboration at the intersection of computational design, systems modeling, research, and industry.

Principal Research Engineer
Office
Centergy One, Suite 420
GTRI
Geogia Tech Research Institute > Cybersecurity, Information Protection, and Hardware Evaluation Research Laboratory

Francisco Valdes Castillo

Francisco Valdes Castillo
francisco.valdes@gtri.gatech.edu
Principal Research Engineer
Phone
404-909-6984
Research Affiliations
System architecture, hardware–software integration, verification and validation, staged integration planning, operational readiness, and the transition of quantum technologies from component demonstrations to scalable systems
GTRI
Geogia Tech Research Institute > Cybersecurity, Information Protection, and Hardware Evaluation Research Laboratory

Patrick Danahy

Patrick Danahy is an Assistant Professor of Architecture at the Georgia Institute of Technology.
patrick.danahy@design.gatech.edu

Patrick Danahy is an Assistant Professor of Architecture at the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Previously, he has held positions as the Emerging Scholar in Design at the University of Texas at Austin, the Design Innovation Fellow at Ball State University and a Lecturer at the University of Pennsylvania. Patrick holds a Bachelor of Arts in Architecture from Clemson University, and a Master of Architecture from the University of Pennsylvania, where he received the Kanter-Tritsch Prize in Energy and Architectural Innovation, the Paul Cret T-Square Fellowship, the Van Alen Traveling Fellowship, the Dales Fellowship, the Kohn Fellowship, the Schenk-Woodman Merit Award and upon graduating was awarded the Arthur Spayd Brooke Memorial Silver Medal.

In 2022, he was selected as the distinguished professor of an Advanced Design Studio at Texas A&M University, where he received the ‘Best Design Studio’ award for that year. He has taught workshops on emerging media and digital technologies including at the 2022 ACADIA conference, the UCL Bartlett RC20 Skills-Share program, the University of Kentucky, the University of Texas at Austin, Texas A&M University, the University of Michigan and the University of Pennsylvania. His teaching focuses on computation and robotics, integrating architectural reference with emerging machine-learning technologies.

Patrick's research has been presented in international conferences including Digital Futures Young, ACADIA, ICRA, TRAITS Post Digital Neobaroque, SIGRADI and CAADRIA, where his team received the award for best presentation runner up. His work has been exhibited internationally at the Venice Biennale, the ENVD Gallery at the University of Colorado Boulder, at the Month of Modern, and in galleries at the Pratt Institute, Ball State University, the University of Texas and the University of Pennsylvania.

Assistant Professor, School of Architecture
Additional Research
  • Computation and robotics
  • Integrating architectural reference with emerging machine-learning technologies.
IRI And Role
University, College, and School/Department

Patrick Kastner

Patrick Kastner's profile picture
pkastner3@gatech.edu

Patrick Kastner is a researcher and educator specializing in environmental performance simulation and decarbonization of buildings and cities, and directs the Sustainable Urban Systems Lab at Georgia Tech. He is an Assistant Professor at the School of Architecture and holds a courtesy appointment with the H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering.

His goal is to empower urban decision-makers with software tools that place sustainability at the forefront of the profession. He leads a Vertically Integrated Project titled Surrogate Modeling for Urban Regeneration (SMUR), which attracts a diverse group of students ranging from sophomore to graduate level, representing various engineering disciplines and other related fields across Georgia Tech.

He earned his Ph.D. and M.S. in Systems Science and Engineering from Cornell University in 2022. During his doctoral research, he developed Eddy3D, a microclimate modeling software toolkit for Rhino & Grasshopper, now adopted by leading institutions in both academia and practice. He previously taught at Cornell and UPenn.

Originally from Germany, Kastner holds an M.S. in Sustainable Building Science from TU Munich, and a B.S. in Energy Engineeringfrom FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg. While in Munich, he was fortunate enough to study at the Center for Digital Technology and Management and enjoyed his time leading the operations team at TEDxTUM.

Assistant Professor, School of Architecture
Adjunct Assistant Professor — H. Milton Stewart School of Industrial and Systems Engineering Director of the Sustainable Urban Systems Lab
University, College, and School/Department

Hui Cai

Hui Cai's profile picture
hui.cai@gatech.edu

Hui Cai is a professor of the School of Architecture at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Prior to joining Georgia Tech, she served as the Chair of the Department of Architecture, and the Director of Research at the Institute of Health and Wellness Design at the University of Kansas. She also previously served as the Health + Science research leader and designer at CallisonRTKL Associates in Dallas. Cai received her Ph.D. degree from the Georgia Institute of Technology after several years of architectural education and practice in China and Singapore.

Dr. Cai’s research focuses on using a performance-driven and evidence-based design approach to analyze the relationship between culture, human behavior, and the physical environment, especially in healthcare settings and healthy communities. Dr. Cai combines various analytical tools in her research, such as space syntax analysis, discrete event simulations, and behavioral mappings. Cai disseminates her work extensively through numerous publications and presentations. Her work in healthcare research has received several awards, including the International Academy Award for Best Research project, AIA-AAH/AAH Foundation Burgun Fellowship, and the Inaugural Wilbur H (Tib) Tusler, Jr. Health Design Research Prize awarded by the Foundation for Health Environments Research. She is recently named as 2021 HCD 10 Healthcare Design Educator. She also served on the Board of Directors for the Environmental Design Research Association (EDRA).

Professor; Executive Director, SimTigrate Design Lab
University, College, and School/Department

Craig Zimring

Craig Zimring's profile picture
craig.zimring@design.gatech.edu

An environmental psychologist and professor emeritus of architecture, Craig Zimring directs the SimTigrate Design Lab. He and his colleagues and students focus on how innovative, research-informed design can improve health and healthcare, and how research can be incorporated into classroom teaching, both to improve design and help students develop skills for practice. He has conducted over $7M in research with and for Mayo Clinic, Emory Healthcare, Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Military Health System, HKS Architects, HDR Architects, and many others, including safety-net clinics and international providers of healthcare. He has published over 100 scholarly and professional publications and received 11 awards for his research. He has given numerous keynote and plenary addresses to organizations and meetings such as Australian Healthcare Week, Institute for Patient and Family-Centered Care, and Chinese Hospital Association. His Ph.D. and master's graduates serve in teaching and leadership positions in universities and practice.

He currently serves on the board of the Center for Health Design and has served on the boards of the Environmental Design Research Association, the National Academies’ Board on Infrastructure and the Constructed Environment, the Joint Commission’s Roundtable on the Hospital of the Future and other organizations. In addition to his work on healthcare, Zimring served as a senior scientist in developing the 2010 New York City Active Design Guidelines and was a founding member of the Center for Active Design.

Professor Emeritus, School of Architecture
Founding Director, SimTigrate Design Lab
Phone
404.894.3915
Office
247 4th Street, #265
Additional Research

Active LivingEnvironmental PsychologyEvidence-Based DesignHealthcare Safety & EffectivenessPatient-Centered Care

University, College, and School/Department
Google Scholar
https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=w2xitTUAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate

Danielle Willkens

Danielle Willkens's profile picture
danielle.willkens@design.gatech.edu

She is an Associate Professor at Georgia Institute of Technology's School of Architecture and a practicing designer, researcher, and educator who is particularly interested in bringing architectural engagement to diverse audiences through interactive projects. Her experiences in practice and research include design/build projects, public installations, and on-site investigations as well as extensive archival work in several countries. As an avid photographer and illustrator, her work has been recognized in the American Institute of Architects National Photography Competition and she has contributed graphics to several exhibitions and publications. As an educator, she was recognized as one of two recipients of the 2017-2018 American Institute of Architecture Students (AIAS)/ Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) New Faculty Teaching Award and a 2021 AIAS Educator Honor Award. 

Her research and practice experiences span design/build, early intervention design education, transatlantic studies, and historic site documentation and visualization. She was an inaugural Mellon History Teaching Fellow at Dumbarton Oaks in fall 2021 for the project "From Plantation to Protest: Visualizing Cultural Landscapes of Conflict in the American South," supporting research and development of the Race, Space, and Architecture in the United States seminar at Georgia Tech. 

Expanding experiences abroad to enrich both teaching and research agendas , she was the 2015 Society of Architectural Historians’ H. Allen Brooks Travelling Fellow. Between June 2016 and May 2017, she traveled to Iceland, the Faroe Islands, Cuba, and Japan to research the impact of tourism on cultural heritage sites; research blog posts can be found here. 

Currently, she is working with Auburn University Associate Professor Liu and an interdisciplinary team from the McWhorter School of Building Science, the Department of History, and the Media Production Group on “Walking in the Footsteps of History”, an experimental survey and modeling project to digitally reconstruct the area south of the Edmund Pettus Bridge during the 'Bloody Sunday' events of March 7, 1965. This project is working to record and represent the built environment through the use of 3D LiDAR scans, UAV photogrammetry, and digital modeling. The team was awarded a $50,000 grant 2019 National Park Service African American Civil Rights Grant Program to compile a Historic Structures Report on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama.

Willkens serves as a Georgia Tech Institute for People and Technology initiative lead for research activities related to just, resilient, and informed communities.

Associate Professor
Research Focus Areas
University, College, and School/Department