Alessandra Zanelli Email and Phone Number

Full Professor at the Architecture, Built Environment and Construction Engineering Department of Politecnico di Milano. She is a member of SPACE (Experimental process for architecture and life cycle of building products) Research Unit at the same Department.Her main interests deal with role of technological innovation in architecture and in industrial design. In particular, she has focused his attention on: temporary systems (tents, minimal units for emergency; mobile homes, ect.); adaptive systems (smart, extensible, foldable, pivots systems, ect); application of lightweight systems and demountable buildings for dwellings. She is professor of building technology in the degree courses in Architecture, Environmental Architecture and Building Construction at the Faculty of Architecture and Society and at the Faculty of Civil Architecture, both of the Politecnico di Milan.She is Associate Member of TensiNet Association, the thematic network for upgrading the built environment in Europe through tensile structures and since 2004 she is the Regional Representative for Italian Universities.She founded in 2008 a Multidisciplinary Research Cluster entitled “Innovative Textiles” (clusTEX) in order to connect different competences of Structural Engineering, Mechanical Engineering, Nautical and Internal Design, Chemical and Material Sciences and finally Building Technology and Environmental Design already available inside of various Departments at the Politecnico di Milano. The aim of this action is to promote an integrated approach for designing with textile materials and lightweight structures and become visible as complete team of work, able to propose innovative techniques for designing, manufacturing, building up and testing all kind of membrane, textile and flexible foil.