Role: Alumni

Dima Ghazal is a Production Assistant at the LASG where she is engaged in the fabrication and assembly of sculptural installation components. She has contributed to the production of Meander at Tapestry Hall, Cambridge, Threshold at San Jose Airport, and Ocean at Nuit Blanche Toronto. Dima holds a Bachelor of Arts in Architectural Design and Urban Studies from the University of Toronto. She has participated in multiple design-build projects across Canada and is interested in exploring digital craftsmanship and fabrication of temporary structures.

Filipe Costa leads and orients the production and assembly of sculptural components for installations at the LASG Studio. He has made contributions to Meander at Tapestry Hall, Cambridge and Threshold at San Jose Airport as well as being a core designer and fabricator for the Geometry Kit: Archimedean Polyhedra folio. Filipe is currently pursuing a M.Arch at Carleton University and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Architectural Studies with a Minor in Visual Studies from the University of Toronto. As a designer, Filipe is interested in researching structures built by animals (animal architecture) for the design of unconventional spaces and building forms.

Nathan Shakura designs systems components and manages production at the LASG studio. Nathan is currently completing a bachelor’s degree in Environmental Design at OCAD University. As a designer, he is interested in small scale woodworking and wood construction, and design as a tool for social change.

Ellie Hayden is the Operations Director at the LASG, steering and overseeing grant applications, project leads, LASG partner and studentship relations, and administrative affairs. Before joining the LASG team, Ellie worked for three of Toronto’s Business Improvement Areas where she liaised with local business owners and city officials to orchestrate a series of community-based public art and streetscaping projects. Ellie’s academic background is in Civil Engineering and Sustainable Development, though her passion lies in community engagement with public space. She holds a BASc in Integrated Social Science and Engineering from Lehigh University, and hopes to pursue a Masters degree in Landscape Architecture in the future.

In his past work with the LASG, Nathanael worked mainly on the industrial design of sculpture components as well as their manufacturing. A main area of focus was updating LED light housings and developing robust heat sinking to extend their lifespans. He also worked on redesigning existing stainless steel cutting patterns of sculptural components for use in permanent installations. In particular, Nathanael developed new forming tools which expedited production.

Nathanael completed his Masters of Architecture at the University of Waterloo in 2021, undertaking thesis research that explored how people interact with the things around them and how we can better teach repair, maintenance, and troubleshooting skills, as well as design items that defy planned obsolescence. Through taking things apart, making tools, and unifying both of those activities to make ‘good stuff’, he lays out how we can change modern material culture for the better.

Thesis: Let’s Make Good Stuff: Combatting planned obsolescence and junk by relearning repair, maintenance, and personal agency over the things around us

Nikola Miloradovic has worked on a variety of permanent and temporary test-beds around the world including Meander, Chun Long Tiao ‘Spring Dragon Tail’, Sentient Chamber, Transforming Space: Aegis and Noosphere, Anthozoan Veil, Aletheia, Futurium Noosphere, Threshold, and Nebula Prototype: Liminal Architecture. Nikola is involved in many steps of the design process including modeling, prototyping, fabrication, visualization, and installation. He is a graduate of the University of Waterloo School of Architecture and is completing his Master of Architecture at the Architectural Association in London, where his research focuses on the leftover spaces of London and potential counter-values to the highly commercial inner-city built landscape.

Mark Francis was responsible for the on-site direction of installations for the LASG/PBSI studio. Along with numerous smaller projects, he carried this responsibility for Amatria at Indiana University, Transforming Space at the Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Noosphere at the Futurium in Berlin, Germany, Radiant Soil in Daejeon, South Korea, and Meander at Tapestry Hall, Cambridge, Ontario. His training includes an M. Arch. degree from UBC and a B. F. A. from York University. He continues to maintain an independent art practice in parallel with his professional work.

Muhammad Tahir Pervaiz served an extended studentship with the LASG during which he produced a thesis that focused on the underlying geometric form-language currently used within studio scaffolds. His thesis Mediation: Resonating Between the Organic and Inorganic at the University of Waterloo School of Architecture includes historical references that expand the context of LASG research-creation. His academic research focused on evolved geometries and form languages, and the relations ‘in-between’ inherent polarities in nature; the organic and the inorganic, conceiving of deep relationships between individual parts and wholes. His work included a focus on the visionary mid-twentieth-century designer Jekabs Zvilna, contributing to LASG coursework and a folio publication, New Geometric Systems: Jekabs Zvilna and Integrative Form-Languages. 

Expanding his studies, Tahir became a designer at the LASG. He has contributed to LASG projects Meander, Threshold, and Le Frout. He graduated with distinction from the National College of Art and is a licensed architect in Pakistan under the Pakistan Council of Architects and Town Planners (PCATP).

Bianca Weeko Martin managed publications for Riverside Architectural Press and led web development, graphic and video editing special projects in addition to designing components for lightweight meshwork installations such as Meander at Tapestry Hall, Cambridge and Threshold at San Jose Airport. She was also involved in the CAST-LASG Workshop at the University of Manitoba and Grove at the 17th Venice Biennale of Architecture. Bianca holds a Master and Bachelor of Architectural Studies from the University of Waterloo. Her thesis work focused on contemporary forms of architectural emplacement, representation and publishing, centered on her father’s ancestral house in the Philippines. She brings various previous experiences from curatorial work at the Art Gallery of Ontario, workshops and education with Shad Canada and the Goethe-Institut Toronto, and architectural internships completed in New York City, Melbourne, and Mexico City. Bianca enjoys exploring different methods of communication in the studio including writing, user interfaces, and quick sketches.

Mac has worked as a designer and installation manager for the Living Architecture Systems Group, on projects including Meander in Cambridge, Threshold in San Jose, and Grove, shown at the 2021 Venice Biennale.

Mac Van Dam is a multi-disciplinary designer working in architecture, art, object design, and material science. He has studied architecture and design at the University of Waterloo (BAS, with distinction), and the Bartlett School of Architecture, Bio-Integrated Design Lab (MArch, with distinction). His work is rooted in a material-led design process and a desire to bring biological/living sensibilities to the everyday. He is currently designing artworks and contemporary forms of urban green infrastructure (Vertical Grounds Design Lab). Before founding design studios, Mac was a research member/artist at the Living Architecture Systems Group in Toronto and has worked at internationally acclaimed architecture firms. His solo work has been shown at the Lisbon Triennale, London Design Festival, MB&F MAD Gallery, Coachella, and several other international exhibitions.