IN-PERSON MADRID FOCUS ON PEDAGOGY. SECTION B
Abstract
Architectural education has been challenged in the past with important changes occurring in the last decades because of the use of digital tools but even more, centuries ago, when architects and their disciples left the construction site and entered the studio and the university. The predominant current challenge is the use of AI and the way it will radically transform architectural education and practice. To understand what this change will bring along we have to realize how architects were educated up to now and consequently what sort of transformations we should be expecting. For this goal, a specific aspect of architectural education, architectural typology, will be presented and analysed in relation to its possible application in curating architectural data for AI use. Understanding how AI systems work is imperative in order to amend and adapt them to the needs of architectural education and practice as described by architects. AI systems for generating or analyzing architecture are trained through large collections of data: building and floor plan datasets, 3D building and city models, architectural imagery and style libraries, BIM and CAD repositories, as well as custom or proprietary corpora. This training is mostly done using rather superficial categorization criteria that simplify and banalize architectural work. Training AI systems through typological principles has the potential to shift machine interpretation from shallow classification to architectural comprehension. Typology offers a mode of categorization that surpasses formal attributes or functional tags and reflects deeper architectural reasoning: the understanding of spatial structure, its logic, and its cultural context. By curating datasets through typological frameworks, AI systems can become capable of engaging architectural design not as automated image production, but as an artificial architectural intelligence, critical, abstract, and culturally aware.
Elisavet Mandoulidou, architect (DUTH), Master in Architecture – Space Planning (NTUA), PhD in Architectural Design and New Technologies (DUTH). She is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Civil Engineering Educators, School of Pedagogical & Technological Education (2024-present) and Director of the Architectural Design and New Technologies Laboratory. She has published award-winning papers in international scientific conference proceedings, journals, and book chapters. She has participated as a research team member in various research programs. Her research interests and academic work focus on the intersection of advanced, digital, and hybrid technologies with art, urban design, and architectural design and fabrication.
Polyxeni Mantzou, Architect NTUA, Master in Conservation and Restoration of the Architectural and Urban Heritage, Master in Advanced Technologies in the Architectural Construction, PhD in Architectural Design ΕTSAM, UPM. She is Professor at the Department of Architecture UOI and Director of the Architectural Design and Digital Technologies Laboratory. Her research interests include the theoretical comprehension and practical implementation of digital media in architectural and urban design and cultural heritage management.
Efi Giannopoulou is an Architect Engineer (DUTH), with a Ph.D. from the Superior School of Architecture, UPM. Her research focuses on the concept of ‘The In-Between’—viewed both as a spatial-temporal object and a transition across scientific disciplines, essential for innovation and harmonious coexistence. She has contributed to national and international conferences, publications, and research projects, expanding the discourse on interdisciplinary design. Currently, she is an Adjunct Professor at the Department of Civil Engineering Educators, School of Pedagogical & Technological Education (2024-present), and she also collaborates with the NKUA and the NTUA on educational and research initiatives.
10:30 am - 12:00 pm
Friday 26th June, 2026