Lars De Laet

Lars De Laet is Associate Professor at the Department of Architectural Engineering at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium, where he was appointed in October 2013 as professor to conduct research in the field of architectural and structural design of resource-efficient structures.

Being educated as an architectural engineer, Lars develops with his team lightweight structures, biological building materials and computer-assisted design methods for sustainable architecture and infrastructure. They develop computational tools for structural design and form-finding, and focus on full-scale prototyping employing new (bio)materials, digital and robotic fabrication technologies and large-scale experimental testing.

Lars is involved in national and European research projects. He was co-chair of the European COST-Action on ‘Novel Structural Skins’ and is a member of various international associations, such as the International Association for Shell and Spatial Structures (IASS) and TensiNet. In addition, Lars has been vice-chair of the board of directors of the VUB, where he is currently a member of. Lars has been elected in 2019 as a member of the Young Academy, part of the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts.