Tohru Horiguchi, Lecturers
Dr. Tohru Horiguchi is a Professor of Architecture at Kindai University. He specializes in contemporary architectural theory and cross-cultural architectural education. Prior to joining Kindai University, he was a Research Assistant under Hitoshi Abe at Tohoku University, including a one-year-term Visiting Scholar at UCLA, an Associate Professor at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto. Among the maniacs in Japan, he is known as the "architecture film detective" who searches and visits filming locations worldwide using Google Street View, and holds screenings and talk events on an irregular basis in Osaka, Kyoto, Sendai and on YouTube. He recently contributed "Geography of Shinji Aoyama, Film Director" to "The Shinji Aoyama Chronicles" (2023, Little More Co., Ltd.).

Liam Young, Lecturer
Liam Young is a designer, director and BAFTA nominated producer renowned for his innovative work at the intersection of design, fiction, and futures. Described by the BBC as ‘the man designing our futures’, his visionary films and speculative worlds are both extraordinary images of tomorrow and urgent examinations of the environmental questions facing us today. As a worldbuilder he visualizes the cities, spaces and props of our imaginary futures for the film and television industry and with his own films he has premiered with platforms ranging from Channel 4, Apple , SxSW, Tribeca, the New York Metropolitan Museum, The Royal Academy, Venice Biennale, the BBC and the Guardian. His films have been collected internationally by museums such as MoMA New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the National Gallery of Victoria and M Plus Hong Kong and has been acclaimed in both mainstream and design media including features with TED, Wired, New Scientist, Arte, Canal , Time magazine and many more. His film work is informed by his academic research and has held guest professorships at Princeton University, MIT, and Cambridge and now runs the ground breaking Masters in Fiction and Entertainment at SCI Arc in Los Angeles. He has published several books including the recent Machine Landscapes: Architectures of the Post Anthropocene and Planet City, a story of a fictional city for the entire population of the earth. 

Hitoshi Abe, Organizer/ Moderator
Hitoshi Abe, Professor and former Chair in the Department of Architecture and Urban Design at the School of Arts and Architecture and Chair in the Study of Contemporary Japan and the Director of the UCLA Paul I. and Hisako Terasaki Center for Japanese Studies. Since 1992, when Dr. Hitoshi Abe won first prize in the Miyagi Stadium Competition and established Atelier Hitoshi Abe, he has maintained an active international design practice based in Sendai, Japan, as well as a schedule of lecturing and publishing, which place him among the leaders in his field. https://aha.design

1.「間」Ma: Time and Space in Japanese Architecture
Hitoshi Abe & Tezzo Nishizawa, Michael Osman
Oct. 29, 2024 (Recorded video will be available)

間 (MA) is a Japanese concept that defines the interval or space between two entities, encompassing both temporal and spatial dimensions, and serves as a foundational principle in various aspects of art, architecture, and life.

2.「矩」Kane: The Canon of Japanese Architecture
Don Choi & Takaharu Tezuka & Yui Tezuka
Dec. 10, 2024 (Recorded video will be available)
In Japanese architecture, the notion of 矩 (kane) serves as a guiding framework for practicing, norms and measurements are harmonized to create a unique aesthetic order. The speakers will talk about how this modular system affects the way they think and design.

3.「廃墟」Hai/kyo: Destruction and Rebirth of Japanese Architecture
Ken Tadashi Oshima & Alicia Volk 
APR. 16, 2025 (ONLINE) 

廃墟 (HAI/KYO) refers to ruins that embody the remnants of historical destruction caused by disasters such as earthquakes, fires, floods, and wars, while also symbolizing themes of rebirth, recovery, and the creation of new urban landscapes.       

5.「数寄」Suki: Microcosm of Tastes
Reijiro Izumi & Kunio Kirisako
JUN. 11, 2025

数寄 (SUKI) originally signified a love for poetry in the Heian period, but evolved to primarily denote the refined aesthetic and cultural appreciation associated with the tea ceremony, reflecting a nuanced relationship between art, architecture, and the appreciation of beauty.