Lydia Kallipoliti

Lydia Kallipoliti is a Greek architect, engineer, architectural historian, action researcher, and scholar. Her work examines interdisciplinary studies involving architecture, technology, and environmental politics. Her research has contributed to the way architecture engages with ecological pedagogies, by confronting waste, recycling, and closed-loop systems.

Early life and education

Kallipoliti grew up in Thessaloniki where she graduated from Anatolia College in 1994. She studied at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, and graduated with a diploma in architecture and engineering. She has a Master of Science in architecture studies from MIT, a Master of Arts and a PhD from Princeton University.

Career

Lydia Kallipoliti is currently the Director of the Master of Science degree in
and an Associate Professor at Columbia Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation in New York. Additionally, she directs ANAcycle a design studio and thinktank in New York. Kallipoliti was a visiting fellow at the Canadian Center for Architecture, the University of Queensland, and a visiting critic at the University of Technology Sydney. Additionally, she was an assistant professor at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, and an assistant professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Syracuse University.

Exhibitions

In 2016, she curated the Closed Worlds exhibition at the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York, supported by grants awarded by the Graham Foundation and the New York State Council on the Arts in 2015. Other editions of the exhibition were held at Woodbury University School of Architecture's WUHO Gallery, and at the University of Technology Sydney's Art Gallery.

Year	Title	Place
2011	Ecoredux 02: Design Manuals for a Dying Planet	Disseny Hub, Barcelona, Spain
2016	Closed Worlds	Storefront for Art and Architecture, New York
2019	Closed Worlds	University of Technology Sydney, Australia
2024	Histories of Ecological Design	Cooper Union, New York

In 2022, Kallipoliti was appointed head co-curator or the Tallinn Architecture Biennale with Areti Markopoilou, following an international competition by the Estonian Museum of Architecture. Their exhibition, "Edible, or, The Architecture of Metabolism," was consequently selected as the winner of the year in universal design in 2023 by the Design Educates Awards. In 2024, she curated the exhibition "Histories of Ecological Design" at Cooper Union in New York in relation to her published book "Histories of Ecological Design: An Unfinished Cyclopedia".

Year	Title	Place
2015	Shenzhen Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism\Architecture . Honorable Mention by the independent jury of the Shenzhen Bi-City Biennale.	Shenzhen, China
2016	The Third Istanbul Design Biennial	Istanbul, Turkey
2017	Onassis Culture	Diplareios School, Athens, Greece
2019	Oslo Architecture Triennale	Oslo, Norway
2019	The Design Museum	London, UK
2020	National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne Design Week	Melbourne, Australia
2021	Biennale Architettura 2021	Venice, Italy
2022	Lisbon Architecture Triennale. Received Bronze Prize in Design Educates Awards, in the Universal Design category, 2023.	Lisbon, Portugal
2023	Shanghai Urban Space Art Season. Shortlisted for The World Architecture Festival 2024 - Temporary Uses.	Shanghai, China
2025	La Biennale Di Venezia, Biennale Architecttura	Venice, Italy
2025	Trienalle di Milano	Milan, Italy

Awards

2010: Webby Awards.
2014: Graham Foundation Production and Presentation Grant for her Closed Worlds exhibition project.
2017: Creative Achievement Award from the .
2019: Best of Design Award for Unbuilt Interiors, The architects Newspaper.
2020: Tallinn Architecture Biennale 2022.
2023:, Winner of the Year in Universal Design.
2023: Graham Foundation Publication Grant for Edible, or, The Architecture of Metabolism.

Books

Lydia Kallipolti is the author of The Architecture of Closed Worlds, published by Lars Müller Publishers and reviewed by the Journal of Architecture, Idea Journal, The Architect's Newspaper, Abitare, Archinect among other journals and media platforms. Additionally, The Architecture of Closed Worlds was featured in HBO's The White Lotus Series, Season 2.
In 2024, Kallipolti published Histories of Ecological Design, published by Actar Publishers. Translated in Chinese by Huazhong University of Science and Technology Press.

Other Books Include

Building Metabolism '', published by Actar Publishers
EcoRedux: Design Remedies for an Ailing Planet , published by Wiley
History of Ecological Design'', published by Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Environmental Science

Selected Review Articles, Chapters, and Research Papers

Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "Dry Rot: The Chemical Origins of British Preservation." Future Anterior
Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "The Soft Cosmos of AD’s ‘Cosmorama’ in the 1960s and 1970s." Architectural Design
Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "No More Schisms." Architectural Design
Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "Eco-Redux: Lydia Kallipoliti: Environmental Architecture from 'Object" to 'System' to 'Cloud.'" PRAXIS: Journal of Writing + Building
Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "From Shit to Food: Graham Caine's Eco-House in South London, 1972-1975." Buildings & Landscapes: Journal of the Vernacular Architecture Forum
Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "Closed Worlds: The Rise and Fall of Dirty Physiology." Architectural Theory Review.
Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "." Volume
Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "" e-flux Architecture.
Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "." Ardeth
Kallipoliti, Lydia., "Contaminating the Red Planet" published by The Design Museum
Kallipoliti, Lydia., Chapter 14 "Big Dog, Or, The Precarious Aesthetics of Tumbling" published by MIT Press
Dragonas, Panos and Kallipoliti, Lydia.. "Silence Murmur." AA Files
Kallipoliti, Lydia., "" e-flux Architecture.
Kallipoliti, Lydia and Theodoridis, Andreas. "Field Notes on Pipes and Plants" Log ''.''