From Field to Form: Stone

A group of experts discuss the evolving potential of structural stone.

March 15, 2023
6:00 p.m.

Time & Location

Wednesday, March 15, 2023 6:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.

189 Banker Street, Greenpoint, Brooklyn, 11222

Reception and exhibition: 6:00 p.m.
Presentation: 7:00 p.m.

This event will not be livestreamed.

Tickets

This event is sold out. To be added to the waitlist, please use the “get tickets” button on the Eventbrite page or email rsvp@archleague.org.

Free for League members
$15 general admission

Current members must use their Member Number to access member tickets. Members who receive League membership through their workplace will receive registration instructions from their office’s membership coordinator.

For help with your Member Number, please email membership@archleague.org.

COVID-19 vaccination is required for all attendees. Face masks are recommended but optional.

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Continuing Education

1.5 New York State and AIA CEUs are available to all participants—both members and non-members—who attend the event in its entirety.

Download the Spring 2023 Events Poster

From Field to Form is a series of events exploring the possibilities, life cycles, and architectural implications of plant- and earth-based materials.

Engineer Steve Webb and stonemason Pierre Bidaud began a partnership in 2009 to radically rethink the possibilities of stone in contemporary construction. Their research demonstrates that structural stone can substantially reduce embodied energy in built form, and their collaborations with a variety of architects have produced striking buildings that recover and amplify the potential of stone as a primary building material.

In “From Field to Form: Stone,” Webb and Bidaud will discuss their evolving research and show examples of their work.

In 2022, Webb and Bidaud debuted Equanimity—an 11-meter-long post-tensioned stone beam—at the Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition. The Equanimity beam and elements of The New Stone Age, an exhibition co-curated at the Building Centre by Webb, Bidaud, and architect Amin Taha, will be on display at ABC Stone’s facility in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, where “From Field to Form: Stone” will take place. The program will be preceded and followed by a reception and opportunity to view the exhibition.

Pierre Bidaud is the creative director of The Stonemasonry Company. He has been a stonemason for over 30 years.

Steve Webb is the cofounder and director of Webb Yates Engineers, a multidisciplinary engineering practice with offices in London and Birmingham. In 2020 Webb was awarded the Milne Medal, given to an individual engineer for excellence in structural design by The Institution of Structural Engineers.

Following their presentations, Bidaud and Webb will be joined for discussion by Jonah Wurzer-Kinsler, a partner at Franken-Schotter GmbH & Co, Germany’s largest producer of limestone and an environmental leader in the stone industry.

The discussion will be moderated by structural engineer Nat Oppenheimer, senior vice president of Silman and a member of the board of directors of The Architectural League.

Support

From Field to Form: Stone is co-sponsored by ABC Stone.

This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.