3835 Campus Drive
Architecture Building (145 ARC)
College Park, MD 20742
United States
Andrea Ponsi, Architetto
Principal Studio Ponsi, Florence, Italy 2017
Kea Distinguished Professor
A Short Discourse on the Long Line
Andrea Ponsi was born in Viareggio in 1949. He graduated in Florence in 1974 under Leonardo Savioli; he earned a Master’s in Architecture at the Architectural Association in London and the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Since the early seventies he has focused on the relationship between ecology and architecture.
In 1977, he published “The Solar House,” a monographic study on bioclimatic architecture. In the 1980s, he lived in San Francisco where he worked with Peter Calthorpe and Sim Van Der Ryn, drawing up projects based on the concept of environmental sustainability. His work—both as a designer and as an architect—has been the subject of publications and personal exhibitions in Italy, the USA and South America. In 2000, he won the international competition for the building of the Palos Verdes Art Center in Los Angeles. His professional activity also includes urban furnishing projects, commercial interiors and preparing exhibitions. He has taught architectural planning and design at several universities including the University of California in Berkeley, the Technion Institute in Haifa, Israel and the University of Toronto. At present, he is Adjunct Professor at Syracuse University in Florence and the United States.