PhD faculty and students offer a circular vision for Architecture at the 2025 Venice Architecture Biennale

PhD Graduate Group faculty Dr. Laia Mogas-Soldevila, and students Bowen Qin, Behzad Modanloo, and Eda Begum Birol participated in this year’s Venice Architecture Biennale with Ramus-0 Large Format Latticed Bio-Cladding for VAMO. Working alongside ETH Zurich, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and global collaborators, DumoLab Research (DLR) at Penn Weitzman, created a lightweight, regenerative installation that explores alternatives to architectural permanence.

VAMO premiered at the 19th International Architecture Exhibition "Intelligens. Natural. Artificial. Collective.", curated by Carlo Ratti and organized by La Biennale di Venezia. The exhibition opens to the public from May 10 to November 23, 2025.

Presented in the Corderie of the Arsenale, VAMO contributes to the Biennale’s call for architecture to shift from mitigation to adaptation and introduces a biodegradable, modular structure made from reclaimed materials. Anchored around a historic brick column, VAMO reimagines the future of architectural practice through circularity. Every component is biodegradable, and most are repurposed: the structure is made of upcycled wood, while cladding and surrounding elements repurpose spent coffee grounds, coconut husks, waste wool and garments, waste Murano glass, leather discards, pineapple peels, fishery and forestry waste in the case of DumoLab's Ramus-0 —all given a second life through unique processes.

DumoLab was commissioned with Ramus-0, comprising four large-scale components for VAMO. 

Our 3 PhD student leads (Bowen Qin, Behzad Modanloo, and Eda Begum Birol) collaborated to deploy ongoing research in our Ramus series, which focuses on regenerative material blends that can be additively manufactured and able to bind wood biomass particles from agricultural and forestry waste without the use of petrochemical-based binders. Arranged, bundled, and latticed patterns are obtained in Ramus-0 stiff rim and axis conditions while preserving overall flexibility and lightness, with the capacity to mediate light, ease of transportation and assembly, and ensure maximum material exposure for fast decay later into forest soils.

Location: Corderie of the Arsenale, Venice, IT

DumoLab's Team: Bowen Qin (PhD Arch), Behzad Modanloo (PhD Arch), Eda Begum Birol (PhD Arch), Alexia Luo (MArch Thesis), Nazhla Alizadegan (MSD-AAD), and Dr. Laia Mogas-Soldevila