Lecture

At the Uncomfortable Frontier of Feminism and Capitalism: Gender and Corporate Real Estate Development in Britain

Corporate Real Estate has long been associated with a particularly patriarchal form of capitalism. High-rise towers, financial citadels and plush board rooms have come to symbolize the architectural manifestation of toxic masculinity, underpinned by aggressive speculative development. Yet women have also worked in, and been responsible for the development of, such spaces for decades. This lecture looks at the frictions and fictions at the encounter of gender and commercial real estate, exploring the history of women in the production and use of office buildings in Britain.

Den Vortrag wird Thomas in englischer Sprache halten.

Über

Dr. A.R. Amy Thomas

Amy Thomas is Associate Professor of architectural history in the Department of Architecture at Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) where her research explores the relationships between design, people, and political economy in the city, at every scale. She is the author of the book The City in the City: Architecture and Change in London’s Financial District (MIT Press, 2023) which details the post-war development of the City of London, and co-editor of the open-access book Teaching Design for Values: Concepts, Tools, and Practices (TU Delft Open, 2022). Thomas has published articles in The Journal of Architecture, Grey Room, Architectural Theory Review and ARCH+. In 2020 she was awarded a ‘VENI’ grant from the Dutch Research Council (NWO) for a three-year project on gender inequality and workplace design. She is an advocate for equality, diversity, and inclusion in architectural education, collaborating internationally on projects of this theme.