Professor of Architecture
Cat Rossi is Professor of Architecture and Research Lead in the Canterbury School of Architecture and Design.
Bio
A design historian, Cat is internationally active as a researcher, writer, curator, educator, and public speaker in a broad range of subjects across design and architecture in the 20th and 21st centuries.
Cat joined UCA as Professor of Architecture in 2022. She is Research Lead in the Canterbury School of Architecture and Design, co-organises the School's Multistory public programme, and is Chair of UCA's REF Working Group. Her teaching commitments include M.Arch dissertations and PhD supervision.
Cat was previously Associate Professor of Design History at Kingston School of Art (2011-2022) where her roles and responsibilities included: Director of Research in the School of Critical Studies and Creative Industries; REF 2021 Unit Coordinator for UoA 32 Art & Design: History, Theory and Practice and Course Leader for BA (Hons) Art & Design History and Practice. She has taught and delivered lectures and seminars at educational and cultural institutions across the UK and internationally.
In 2011 Cat was awarded her PhD, an AHRC CDA at the RCA/V&A, on ‘Crafting Modern Design in Italy: from Postwar to Postmodernism’. She completed an MA (Distinction) in the History of Design and Material Culture at the University of Brighton in 2006, and in 2005 graduated with a first class BA (Hons) in Italian and Design from UCL.
Research statement
Cat’s research areas include 20th and 21st century design, architecture and craft, post-war Italian design and architecture, club culture, and feminism; a diverse range of subjects underpinned by questions of social responsibility, environmentalism, and the politics of design and architecture.
Her publications include Designing Craft in Italy: from Postwar to Postmodernism (MUP, 2015), and Post-Craft (Sternberg Press, 2022) and The Italian Avant-Garde (Sternberg Press, 2013), both co-edited with Professor Alex Coles. In addition to authoring chapters for edited publications, she has contributed to peer-reviewed journals including The Journal of Design History, Design and Culture and The Journal of Modern Craft. Cat has also contributed articles to publications including The Architectural Review, Disegno, Dirty Furniture and the Financial Times.
Cat has co/curated several international exhibitions. These include: Space Electronic: Then and Now, 14th Venice Architecture Biennale (2014); Radical Design: Architecture and Nightlife in Italy, 1965 – 1975, co-curated with Sumitra Upham at ICA London (2015 – 2016) and the touring exhibition Night Fever: Designing Club Culture 1960 to Today, co-curated with Jochen Eisenbrand and Nina Serulus, Vitra Design Museum (2018 - 2022) and At Home: panoramas de nos vies domestiques, with Jana Scholze and Penny Sparke, Biennale International Design Saint-Étienne (2021).
Her research was submitted to REF2014 and REF 2021. For the latter she submitted the Impact Case Study “Designing Night Life: Informing New Curatorial Activity in International Design Museums on the Design History of Club Culture”.
Cat regularly engages in public events to share her research and has contributed to podcasts and programmes including A is for Architecture, Monocle Radio, BBC Radio 4, SAHGB and Times Radio.
Research supervision
Cat is interested in hearing from research degree applicants whose proposals intersect with her areas of interest. Cat has supervised a number of PhDs to completion and served as an external PhD examiner in the UK and internationally.
Her current PhD students are:
- Sofia Cotrona, UCA/Imperial War Museum AHRC CDP, “The Social Impact of Community Participation and Co-Creation in a Museum with Imperial War Museums”.
- Cathy Hawley, “Mothers Making Space”.
- Anna Kampouri, “Spatial representations as metanarrative in children’s graphic novels: an architect’s perspective to graphic narration”.
- Dufie Sakyiama, “Asante Contemporary Jewellery: A Study of the Philosophical Meaning and Cognitive Interaction between the Artist and the Maker, Viewer and Wearer”.
- Pierre Shaw, “Critical Spatial Praxis: Creating Conditions and Pedagogies of Support”.
- Chloe Young, “Domestic Ecologies: An Ethnographic Study of Multi-Species Cohabitation”.
- Kate Devine (RHUL), “Expressions of Craft in Twentieth Century Italian Art and Design”.
Professional Membership, Affiliation and Consultancy
- Senior Fellow, Higher Education Academy
- Member, Peter Dormer Committee
- Member, Journal of Design History Editorial Board
- Member, AIS/Design Journal Editorial Board
- Member, Journal of Modern Craft Advisory Board
- Advisory role, Museum of Youth Culture
- Brother, Art Workers Guild
- Member, Design History Society
Cat regularly reviews for academic journals and publishers.
Cat has served as a peer reviewer for funding organisations including the AHRC, Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT, Portugal), Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique (Belgium) and Swiss National Science Foundation.
- Chelsea College of Design, UAL, BA Interior Design, 2022-present.
- Bath School of Architecture and Design, Periodic Review: Historical & Critical Studies, 2018.
- Central St Martins, UAL, BA (Hons) Product and Furniture, 2015-18.
- Co-Investigator (co-curator), Biennale Internationale Design Saint-Étienne 2022 (2020 – 2022). Link here.
- Shortlisted, AHRC/BBC New Generation Thinker (2020).
- Co-Convenor, TECHNE Training and Development Day Awards (2020, 2018 and 2017).
- Principle Investigator (curator), 2021 Craft Scotland, Craft & Cultural Conversations programme, “Craft & Community” (2021). Link here.
- AHRC workshop participant, Development through the Creative Economy in China, Shanghai (2017).
- Principle Investigator (co-curator), Night Fever: Designing Club Culture 1960 – Today, Vitra Design Museum, Germany (2017-2022).
- Principal Investigator China’s Creative Communities: Making Value and the Value(s) of Making, AHRC (2016).
- Co-Investigator, Living Research: Making in China, British Council/ AHRC (2016).
- Principle Investigator, Biennale di Venezia, Space Electronic: Then and Now installation (2014).
- Expert Visitor, IASPIS, (2014).