Ariel Koltun-Fromm
Ariel, from Haverford, Pennsylvania, and winner of the Kanter Tritsch Prize, took a meandering route into the practice of architecture. Before starting at Penn, Ariel studied math at Williams College, dabbled in language teaching, and pursued a research degree in architectural history and theory at Cambridge. His multidisciplinary research background has taught him to see space as a vessel of deeply embedded, and sometimes contentious, narrative histories which demand care and stewardship.
Ariel is deeply concerned with the relevance, responsibility, and labor ethics of building practice, and is interested in new models of professional architectural work. Toward this end Ariel has contributed to the running of MEANTIME, the non-profit arm of Philadelphia’s ISA Architects, with design-build work to program and activate vacant storefronts with pop-up retail, exhibitions, and performances by local creatives. He is particularly interested in problems of urban infill housing and tactical community-based design. Ariel also explores work outside of traditional practice. He has taught English in Germany on a Fulbright Fellowship, has worked as a research assistant for the Department and for Denise Scott Brown, and has publish his work on the contested histories of synagogue reconstruction in Germany in Architectural Research Quarterly.
Ariel is deeply concerned with the relevance, responsibility, and labor ethics of building practice, and is interested in new models of professional architectural work. Toward this end Ariel has contributed to the running of MEANTIME, the non-profit arm of Philadelphia’s ISA Architects, with design-build work to program and activate vacant storefronts with pop-up retail, exhibitions, and performances by local creatives. He is particularly interested in problems of urban infill housing and tactical community-based design. Ariel also explores work outside of traditional practice. He has taught English in Germany on a Fulbright Fellowship, has worked as a research assistant for the Department and for Denise Scott Brown, and has publish his work on the contested histories of synagogue reconstruction in Germany in Architectural Research Quarterly.
