Ena Lloret-Fritschi Leads Newly Established Institute at USI

NCCR DFAB Principal Investigator Prof. Ena Lloret-Fritschi has been appointed Director of the newly established Institute for Sustainable Architecture and Technology (IAST) at USI. The Institute brings together heritage conservation, adaptive reuse, structural engineering, digital technologies, and sustainability strategies in a holistic approach to advance research and innovation in architecture, fostering collaboration across these complementary fields at the Accademia di architettura in Mendrisio.

Prof. Ena Lloret-Fritschi lecturing at USI in Mendrisio. Photo by NCCR DFAB

Ena, the Institute aims to develop knowledge and raise awareness of sustainable architecture and technology. How do you envision this taking shape?

Our aim is to create an environment in which research, teaching, and public exchange reinforce each other in a natural way. We will build on formats already familiar to the Accademia—lectures, workshops, and small-scale experiments—while opening space for dialogue around sustainability and construction culture. Rather than staging large initiatives such as events, we seek to cultivate an atmosphere in which ideas can be tested, shared, and discussed. This allows the Institute to grow step by step, shaped by opportunities and collaborations that emerge.

How can digital fabrication and digital technology be integrated into the Institute’s work?

Digital fabrication and digital technology have become part of every planning culture—tools that help us see, understand, and shape the built environment. They allow us to capture what exists, understand its behaviour, and reveal the potential for precise, low-carbon interventions. Within the Institute, these tools are applied across research, teaching, and experimental formats. They help us recognise potential in existing buildings and new structures, in traditional and innovative materials and support interventions that are more responsive and intelligent. In this way, digital fabrication naturally becomes part of how we explore architectural questions and develop design approaches.

The IAST brings together expertise across four key domains. How do these areas interact?

The strength of the Institute lies in the dialogue between its fields. Heritage and repair help us understand the value and condition of what already exists; structural thinking gives us clarity about what is possible; and technology introduces new ways of seeing and new processes that can reduce material use and guide more careful interventions. These perspectives meet naturally in the way we approach transformation—whether of existing buildings or new structures. Rather than forcing integration, we let it grow from shared questions and from the complementary experience of the board. This creates a holistic, but very grounded way of working.

What does this integration of expertise within the Institute mean to you as Director?

I have worked for years at the intersection of technology and architecture, exploring how materials, digital tools, and fabrication processes can support more intelligent ways of building, so this integration resonates with my own research path. Leading the Institute together with Muck Petzet—whose work is rooted in the principles of Reduce, Reuse, Recycle—creates a very complementary dialogue. His focus on repair and transformation and my focus on technological and material innovation meet naturally in the institute’s vision. Our role as co-directors is to support these connections and create a culture where ideas can develop thoughtfully, slowly, and in response to real needs.

How will the IAST involve students and doctoral researchers to foster interdisciplinary skills?

Our PhD researchers play an important role in shaping the Institute. They conduct deep research in the fields represented at IAST, and their work naturally finds its way into teaching, workshops, and smaller experimental settings. Through this, students are exposed to current questions in heritage, structure, materials, and technology. We do not expect them to master every discipline, but to gain confidence in moving between them. The aim is to create an environment where doctoral research, teaching, and hands-on exploration inform one another and help students understand architecture within a broader cultural and technological landscape.

The Inauguration Ceremony of the Institute for Sustainable Architecture and Technology (IAST) will take place on Thursday, April 16, 2026.

Read more about the Institute here: https://www.usi.ch/en/feeds/32912