‘From the City of Plans’ explores the historical and present models of technical cooperation and research collaboration to understand their implications on ‘pedagogy and curricula’, spatial development [in Ghanaian metropolises of Greater Accra and Kumasi], resource use / management and local empowerment, and to address identifiable imbalances in these models. Ruth-Anne Richardson would connect the following outcomes and reference works: 

• re-shaping cultures of architecture knowledge production and transference across global divides
• comparing competing and evolving ideas of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) campus design in connection with issues of land, water management, building technologies, climate, program and community relationships since the 1940s [project reference: Neither an Island nor a Hole]
• mapping resistant forms of spatial logic and arrangement [project reference: the Makola Market transcripts]

Ruth-Anne NAS Richardson is a practising Ghanaian architect, writer and principal of StudioRED in Accra. She is a member of the African Futures Institute (AFI) research team, appointed in 2022 as AFI Research Team Lead. She was an invited panelist at the 2023 London Science Museum’s pre-COP28 event, “Towards Nature Positive, Smart Net Zero Cities” and invited speaker at the 3rd Ghana Green Building Summit in July 2020.

Her studio explores new and neglected ways of designing / shaping community, dignity and inclusivity in urban-rural Ghanaian landscapes, while focusing research on water urbanisms in Ghana. She has co-led archival research projects and served as reviewer for architecture design studios at both KNUST (Kumasi) and CU (Miotso). She is a proponent for the local restructuring of architectural pedagogy towards a focus on creative agency, reimagined design frameworks and sustainable building technologies for Ghana.

Ruth-Anne was awarded the Republic of Ghana Presidential Honour of Distinguished Service in March 2023 for her role in the design and construction of Ghana’s first Infectious Diseases Center (GIDC) in Accra. She is an Azrieli Visiting Critic for Carleton University’s Winter 2024 Graduate Option Studio and Academic Critic for AFI’s 2024 Nomadic African Studio. She is currently working on select institutional building projects in Ghana.

Julio D. Dávila is UCL Professor of Urban Policy and International Development. A civil engineer and urban development planner with international experience in research and consultancy projects in 15 countries in Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and Asia, his research focuses on the role of local government in progressive social and political transformation in developing countries; the governance dimensions of urban and peri-urban infrastructure (transport, and water & sanitation); the intersection between planning and urban informality; and linkages between rapid urbanisation and health. 

Between September 2012 and August 2020 Prof. Dávila was the Director of The Bartlett Development Planning Unit, UCL. He has been a consultant to international organisations such as The World Bank, GIZ and DFID, among others, and is a Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers (UK). Prior to UCL, Prof. Dávila was a research fellow at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) in London and Buenos Aires, and worked as a planner with the Colombian Government. In 1988 he co-founded the journal Environment & Urbanization (Sage), one of the most influential and widely quoted international journals in the urban field. 

Among his published books is a volume co-edited in 2000 with Rob Brook entitled ‘The Peri-urban Interface: A Tale of Two Cities’, summarising extensive research undertaken as part of a major effort funded by the UK Government’s Department for International Development (DFID) on the impact of expanding cities upon natural resources in the areas surrounding Kumasi (Ghana) and Hubli-Dharwad (India).

This event joins the efforts of the Bartlett School of Architecture’s CRUNCH Lecture Series and the Global Engagement Fund ‘Repairing historical collaborations between KNUST and UCL in the DPU’s 70th anniversary’ that has been put forward in collaboration with DPU, History of Art, IAS, the Architectural Association, and the V&A. And lately has been joined by the UCL initiatives MoHoA and the UCL Centre for Transnational and Global History.