Florian Urban
Florian Urban
- Head of History of Architecture and Urban Studies (HAUS)
- ORCID
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1953-3045- Professional Title
- Professor
- Job Title
- Head of History of Architecture and Urban Studies (HAUS)
- School or Academic Area
- Mackintosh School of Architecture
- School or Academic Area Supervised for
- Mackintosh School of Architecture
- F.Urban@gsa.ac.uk
- Professional Address
- 167 Renfrew Street Glasgow G3 6RQ
- Country
- United Kingdom
Biography
Prof. Florian Urban
E-mail: f.urban@gsa.ac.uk
Florian Urban is Professor of Architectural History, and Head of History of Architectural and Urban Studies. He holds a Master of Fine Arts from the University of the Arts in Berlin, an MA in Urban Planning from UCLA and a Ph.D. in History and Theory of Architecture from MIT.
He was born and raised in Munich/Germany and spent most of his adult life in Berlin before moving to Glasgow in 2010. Before joining the Mackintosh School of Architecture he taught at the Center for Metropolitan Studies, Berlin Technical University and worked for the German Federal Institute for Research on Construction, Urban Affairs and Spatial Development (BBSR). Since 2009 he has been the Book Reviews Editor-in-Chief for the journal Planning Perspectives.
He is the Secretary of the European Architectural History Network (EAHN)
Publications: https://radar.gsa.ac.uk/view/creators/518.html
Research Interests
-History of architecture in the urban context, particularly in the 20th century,
-Architecture and Energy in historic buildings,
-Postmodern architecture,
-Architecture under socialism, particularly in Poland and in East Germany,
-New Tenements, that is, dense
Grants
2018/19 German Historical Institute Warsaw (D/PL) Six-month grant as a visiting scholar to research “Postmodern Architecture in Poland”
2014-16 Leverhulme Trust (UK) Two-year research grant for “The New Tenement”
2013-14 University of Puerto Rico/ National Endowment for the Humanities (USA) Six-months invitation as a visiting professor and researcher, financed by the National Endowment of the Humanities, teaching (in Spanish) and research
2013 Royal Society of Edinburgh (UK) Research grant to study “Balmoral Castle in a European Context”
2012 Book Prize of the International Planning History Society (IPHS) for Tower and Slab („best book on planning history written in English and based on original research”)
2007 Geschwister-Böhringer-Ingelheim Foundation (Germany) Grant to publish my book „Berlin, DDR-Neo-historisch“ in German
2007 Fritz-Thyssen Foundation (D) one-year research grant for the research of tower block developments in Europe, America, and Asia
2005 Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Council, D) Summer Fellowship to complete my doctoral dissertation, research at the Center for Metropolitan Studies Berlin
2005 Center for European Studies, Harvard University (USA) research grant for doctoral research in East Germany
2004 Society of Architectural Historians (USA) Opler Award for academic publication of young researcher
2003-2004 Studienstiftung des Berliner Abgeordnetenhauses (Foundation of the Berlin Parliament, Germany, D) one-year grant to conduct research in East Berlin
2001-2005 MIT Department of Architecture (USA)
five-year grant to complete doctoral studies in History, Theory, and Criticism of Architecture (full tuition fees plus salary as a teaching assistant)
PGR Supervision Interests
see research interest
Former PGR Students
Sean Kinnear, PhD 2022, funded by the Scottish Graduate School for Arts and Humanities (SGSAH), Thesis: "Out of the Shadows: How Cold War nuclear bunkers, constructed between 1950 and 1970, secretly impacted Scotland’s architectural history."
Xiaohan Lu, PhD 2024, Thesis: "Adaptive Reuse of Warehouses in Glasgow’s Merchant City"
Teaching
Florian teaches lecture courses and seminars in history and theory of architecture at the undergraduate and postgraduate level
Latest Additions
- Urban, Florian and Calder, Barnabas (2025) Form Follows Fuel - 14 Buildings from Antiquity to the Oil Age. Routledge, Abingdon, Oxon.. ISBN 9781032639888 (hardback), 9781032636542 (paperback)
- Urban, Florian (2025) Eco-Pomo in Milton Keynes. Architectural Histories. ISSN 2050-5833
- Urban, Florian (2024) Does Postmodern Mean Capitalist? On Postmodernism and the Planned Economy in Poland and the German Democratic Republic. A+U Architekura Urbanizmus, 57 (3-4). pp. 162-175. ISSN 0044-8680
- Urban, Florian and Golda-Pongratz, Kathrin (2024) Beyond Formal and Informal: Mid-twentieth-century Residential Architecture in Barcelona's El Carmel Neighbourhood. Urban History. pp. 1-31. ISSN 0963-9268
- Urban, Florian (2023) La Perla, Puerto Rico: Beyond Formal and Informal. In: The Oxford Handbook of the Modern Slum. Oxford Handbooks . Oxford University Press, pp. 516-537. ISBN 9780190879457
- Urban, Florian (2023) Tower Blocks, Infills, Eco Estates — The Discourse on Social Housing in West Germany. In: The Social Dimension of Social Housing. Spector Books, Leipzig, pp. 248-263. ISBN 9783959056533
- Urban, Florian and Calder, Barnabas (2022) "It is time no longer to praise the Seagram Building, but to bury it" [comparison of the energy profile of Mies van der Rohe’s iconic Seagram Building with Waugh Thistleton’s 6 Orsman Road]. Architects Journal, 249 (108). ISSN 0003-8466
- Urban, Florian and Calder, Barnabas (2022) Hebridean blackhouse vs volume housebuilder home – energy profiles compared. Architects Journal, 249 (8). pp. 24-31. ISSN 0003-8466
- Urban, Florian (2022) The End of the Planned City? Urban Planning after 1989. In: European Planning History in the 20th Century - A Continent of Urban Planning. Routledge, Abingdon, pp. 256-267. ISBN 9781032222271; 9781003271666 (ebook)
- Urban, Florian (2022) The Old Town of Elblag - a Postmodern Historic Monument. City: History, Culture, Society, 1 (13). pp. 334-351. ISSN 2616-4280
