Way Beyond Bigness: The Need for a Watershed Architecture

You are cordially invited to attend the guest lecture by Derek Hoeferlin and Duong Van Ni:

Date: Thursday, 3 Oct 2024

Time: 6:00 PM – 8:00 PM

Venue: SDE3 Level 4 LT 427 – Design Forum

CPD points for SILA: 2

Kindly register your interest here: https://tinyurl.com/mtpd97fc

Way Beyond Bigness: The Need for a Watershed Architecture

Derek Hoeferlin will introduce his book Way Beyond Bigness: The Need for a Watershed Architecture (Applied Research + Design Publishing, 2023), a design-research project that studies the Mekong, Mississippi and Rhine river basins. With particular focus on multi-scaled, water-based infrastructural transformation that are at risk due to climate change and other factors, the book proposes a simple design-research methodology, structured as: Appreciate + Analyze, Speculate + Synthesize, and Collaborate + Catalyze.

The book includes the author’s comprehensive work of over the last two decades, including in depth field research culminating in the “Mekong, Mississippi and Rhine River Basin Atlas,” speculative trans-boundary design-proposals, and unique community-engaged efforts, along with a diverse body of academic and multi-disciplinary professional collaborations and contributions of compelling research within each river basin. The lecture will include one such contribution by Dr. Duong Van Ni from Can Tho, Vietnam. His chapter contribution “Monitor” describes his community-engaged efforts with local farmers to track aspects of climate change, such as saline intrusion, to help inform coastal ecology and adaptation strategies in the Mekong delta.

Dr. Duong Van Ni will introduce his ongoing project on Coastal ecology and adaptation strategies in the Mekong delta of Vietnam. Since 2018, the project aims to support coastal communities of the Mekong Delta to adapt to flooding and saltwater intrusion, by choosing appropriate crops and aquacultures along with building people’s internal resources so that they can promote self-resilience against natural disasters in the present and the future. We chose a type of grass, named Bulrush, adapted to salinity and tolerant of flooding to grow in combination with shrimp and crab ponds and use their raw materials to make handicrafts. After 5 years of implementation, soil fertility and water quality in the ponds are improved and people now have a stable income.

Derek Hoeferlin is an architect and leads [dhd] derek hoeferlin design, an award-winning architecture, landscape, and urban design practice based in St. Louis, USA. He is a tenured professor and chair of the landscape architecture program at the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts at Washington University in St. Louis. Hoeferlin is principal investigator of Way Beyond Bigness: The Need for a Watershed Architecture, which is the title of his book (Applied Research + Design Publishing, 2023), where he collaboratively researches integrated water-based design strategies across the Mississippi, Mekong, and Rhine River basins.

Dr. Duong Van Ni  is a senior lecturer and environmentalist of the Department of Natural Resources and Environment at Can Tho University. He is the CEO of the Wetland University Network with 22 university members from China, Myanmar, Lao, Thailand, Cambodia, Malaysia and Vietnam from 2002-2017. Dr. Duong received his Ph.D. in environmental science from the London University in United Kingdom. His work on wetlands and sustainable development in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam has been published in various local and foreign scientific journals. Dr. Duong has cooperated with officers on many environmental and climate change projects as well as facilitated trips to Can Tho for a number of delegations visit to the Mekong delta.