The Open Dialogues.research matters 2026 cycle consists of five moments of critical reflection and thematic deepening, based on the practices of guests from different European schools and research centers.

The conferences, promoted within the scope of the Research Seminar course — study option A: Housing Space Design and Ways of Living, are open to all students enrolled in the Doctoral Program in Architecture (PDA) at FAUP.

Program:

13 de março | Carlo Gandolfi (Parma) [Salão Nobre]
20 de março | Enrico Molteni (Genova) [Sala CCR.01]
10 de abril | Nelson Mota (Delft) [Sala E4.03 + online]
08 de maio | Paolo Cascone (London) [Sala E4.03 + online]
22 de maio | Fabio Lepratto (Milan) [Sala E4.03 + online]

Carlo Gandolfi (1980) was born in London and studied architecture at the Politecnico di Milano (graduating with Giorgio Grassi) and at FAUP, as part of the Erasmus program (2002/03). He obtained his PhD in Architectural Composition from the Università IUAV di Venezia, with a thesis on the work of Paulo Mendes da Rocha. He has taught at the Politecnico di Torino and the Politecnico di Milano and, over the years, has given lectures at various universities and participated in numerous international conferences. He has been editor of FAMagazine (since 2010) and a member of the editorial board of Stoà magazine. In 2005, he founded bunker arc, a design and research studio operating between Milan, Venice, Lisbon, and São Paulo, developing projects covering various scales. He lives and works in Milan and, since 2013, has been teaching Design at the University of Parma, where he is an associate professor.

Enrico Molteni (1969) was born in Mariano Comense, Italy, and is an architect and professor. He graduated from the Politecnico di Milano and Arkitektskolen Aarhus (Denmark), completing his PhD at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya with the thesis ‘Álvaro Siza: Private Houses 1954–2004’. His relationship with Portuguese architecture includes collaboration with Alcino Soutinho, notably in the New Town Hall in Seregno competition (1st prize, 1999). He worked with Elias Torres in Barcelona and began his professional career in Milan in 1997, first as liverani-molteni architetti and later as “Enrico Molteni Architecture.” His practice, with projects in Italy, South Korea, and Thailand, has been published in magazines and books, internationally awarded, and widely exhibited. He has lectured and taught at various schools, notably at the Mendrisio Academy of Architecture from 2008 to 2016. He is currently a professor at the Università degli Studi di Genova. In addition to his professional and academic activities, he contributes to various books and publications as the author of critical essays, mainly on the work of Álvaro Siza, and was a member of the editorial board of Casabella magazine for over ten years.

Nelson Mota (1973) was born in Mesão Frio and is an associate professor at TU Delft (Netherlands), where he leads the Global Housing group and co-leads the Global Urban Lab program at the Delft Global Initiative. He received his PhD from TU Delft with the thesis ‘An Archaeology of the Ordinary: Rethinking the Architecture of Dwelling from CIAM to Siza’ (2014). He is the author of the book ‘A Arquitetura do Quotidiano’ (edarq, 2010), co-editor of ‘Global Housing: Dwelling in Addis Ababa’ (JapSam Books, 2020), and editor and member of the editorial board of the academic journal Footprint and the DASH - Delft Architectural Studies on Housing collection.

Paolo Cascone (1976) was born in Italy and grew up between the West Indies and East Africa. With a degree in architecture from Naples, he began his research into advanced design, digital fabrication, and self-construction during his master's degree in sustainable design at the Architectural Association (London, UK) and his PhD in environmental engineering at the University of Rome. In recent years, he has developed interdisciplinary projects with international firms and built case studies between Europe and Africa in the fields of environmental parametric design, digital fabrication, and smart construction. He has taught as an associate professor at ENSA Paris/Malaquais and at the École Spéciale d’Architecture de Paris, where he founded CODESIGNLAB. In 2013, he founded the ‘Urban Fabrication Laboratory’, specializing in urban ecologies and digital fabrication. In 2015, his work was presented at the XXI Milan Triennale, entitled '21st Century. Design after Design', and in 2016, he received, with UFL, a grant from the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs to implement the ‘African Fabbers School’ in Cameroon. He is currently a senior lecturer at the University of Westminster, in the Department of Architecture and Cities, in London.

Fabio Lepratto (1984) was born in Milan and is an architect and doctorate graduate from the Polytechnic University of Milan. In 2017, he presented his doctoral thesis entitled ‘Urban Bricolage’. Il progetto contemporaneo per trasformare la residenza collettiva del secondo dopoguerra: obiettivi, metodi, strumenti' (Urban Bricolage: The Contemporary Project to Transform Post-World War II Collective Housing: Objectives, Methods, Tools). Interested in the relationship between housing and the city, he is dedicated to the study of contemporary ways of living, with a special focus on the transformation of post-war housing. He is a professor at the Polytechnic University of Milan and a researcher in the Department of Architecture and Urban Studies. He also works as a consultant on housing and urban design projects. In 2021, he published the book ‘Trasformare Case e Quartieri’.

Unidade curricular - Seminário de Investigação, opção de estudos A — Projeto do Espaço Habitacional e Formas do Habitar  | PDA, em colaboração com o grupo de investigação Atlas da Casa do Centro de Estudos Nuno Portas
Docentes - Helder Casal Ribeiro, Raquel Paulino

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