The Architect’s Measure: Data and the Built Environment

Join us on 12 August for a webinar with Dr Christopher Bamborough, from Arch_Manu, UNSW. Dr Bamborough will explore how data is reshaping architectural thinking and practice – both as a technical tool and a cultural framework – and the essential data literacy that architects require for future practice.

Data is changing the way architects work today. Architects aren’t just using data as a tool – they’re designing within it. Data influences what architects prioritise while embedding an economic and technical logic into the process affecting how the built environment is conceived, evaluated, and constructed. 

This Arch_Manu session will draw from historical analysis and contemporary case studies to show how measurement and abstraction have shifted from tools of representation to frameworks that define architectural value, decision-making, and spatial production. It will explore how data’s influence through abstraction and synthesis has reorganised the discipline’s foundational acts of observation, prediction, and instruction. It will look beyond technology to investigate how data has become a cultural framework – structuring decisions, framing ethics, and defining the boundaries of design itself. Our speaker will advocate for a critical data literacy that equips architects to operate within complex information systems while recognising architecture’s evolving cultural role.

This webinar is in collaboration with Arch_Manu: ARC Centre for Next-Gen Architectural Manufacturing ITTC.

OUR SPEAKER

Dr Christopher Bamborough is a Post Doctoral Research Fellow at the University of New South Wales, working within the ARC Centre for Next-Generation Architectural Manufacturing (Arch_Manu). His research examines the role of data in architectural practice, focusing on its technical, cultural, and material impacts. His PhD thesis argued that while data has long been integral to architecture, its digital form introduces a significant and evolving non-human influence on practice. AI and automation are central to this shift, raising critical questions about authorship and the evolving role of human designers. Dr Bamborough’s work highlights the moments where architects enter into machine collaboration and explores the practical and material consequences of these interactions. Trained as an architect in the UK and Australia, Dr Bamborough gained experience working in Architecture and Design for Manufacture (DfM) practices before transitioning into academia, where he has spent over 15 years teaching, lecturing and researching computational design, digital fabrication and construction.

WHERE & WHEN

Live online. Recording available.
1pm AEST Tuesday 12 August 2025
Local times – WA 11am–12pm, NT & SA 12.30–1.30pm, Qld, ACT, NSW, Tas & Vic 1–2pm

Completion of this 1 hour webinar series and submission of the self-checked assessment task for each webinar will deliver 1 formal CPD point.

Learning outcomes – This CPD session will provide a framework for thinking about and working with data in architectural practice. It will provide participants with critical skills to understand where engaging with data-driven decision making may result in genuine improvements or may invite bias.

Units of Competency and Performance Criteria – Project Initiation & Conceptual Design – PC 18, PC 28

PBSA Core Area – Design

The webinar will include time for Q&A and a CPD assessment task. Certificates will be issued following participation in the full webinar and online submission of answers to CPD questions.

CONTACT