Kiel Moe

Kiel Moe (US), FAIA, FAAR, is an architect and forest-building ecologist based in Halifax, Vermont, whose work investigates the intersection of design, energy, and environmental performance. He has been recognized with numerous honors, including a Fulbright Distinguished Chair in Helsinki, the Gorham P. Stevens Rome Prize in Architecture at the American Academy in Rome, the Architecture League of New York Prize, and the American Institute of Architects National Young Architect Award.

Moe has published several influential books, including Empire, State & Building, Wood Urbanism: From the Molecular to the Territorial, Insulating Modernism: Isolated and Non-Isolated Thermodynamics in Architecture, and Convergence: An Architectural Agenda for Energy, which explores the relationships between architecture, materiality, and energy systems. His research and design work combines rigorous technical understanding with creative architectural practice, bridging theory, pedagogy, and built environment interventions.

SESSION

13.40 – 14.40 (EN)

KIEL MOE | LESS IS LESS. UNLESS

Architecture today reorganises nature and society in ways that demand attention and new methods of description. In particular, the immense material, energy, and labour involved in building require a new interpretation. While modernism taught us to ask what a building looks like, Moe encourages us to ask what ecological materials and social processes a building sets in motion, before, during, and long after its construction. Can we, through the example of one of the most modern of modern architectures, the Seagram Building, cultivate a broader definition of what architecture is and could be?

Kiel Moe (US): Architect, Researcher, Author, and Forest-Building Ecologist

Moderator: Lasse Lind (DK): Architect, Partner, 3XN/GXN