ProfessorDaniel K Brown

Daniel teaches in the Architecture studio design programme: 300, 400 and 500-level. Daniel has supervised 117 Master’s Thesis students and 6 PhD students. He has examined 151 Master’s Thesis students and 5 PhD students. He has been the PhD Examination Panel Chairman for 64 PhD examinations.

Daniel has also taught numerous cross-disciplinary (Architecture, Interior Architecture, Landscape Architecture, and Industrial Design) studio design elective courses, including Narrative Design, Project Advancement and Portfolio Design, and International Field Study. Previously, Daniel was the Programme Director for Interior Design/Architecture for two 3-year terms (2004–2007; 2009–2012), during which he taught Years 3, 4 and 5 Interior Architecture studio design courses.

Daniel was one of only 12 academics selected worldwide to appear in the August 2021 special edition of Neil Spiller's (ed) Architectural Design (AD): Emerging Talents | Training Architects: "This issue showcases the students and teachers who are pushing the envelope of architecture in extraordinary ways, offering their insights into its future materiality and spatial dexterity. It premieres a new young generation of architects who are likely to become names in the architectural profession and possibly important teachers themselves. Their work has been selected by their own influential teachers of architecture who describe the studio methodologies – and reasons for them – that prompted the work."

His research-led teaching explores how regional buildings - inside and outside - can achieve landmark status through design. His Research-Led Postgraduate Teaching explores Narrative Architecture and the Architecture of Dystopia. This research challenges our built environment to arrive at new solutions to 21st century problems we are facing: partially completed urban infrastructures or abandoned and dilapidated buildings resulting from economic recession; sites transformed by destructive strip mining, rising sea levels, global warming; sites damaged by war, abandonment, earthquakes, tsunamis, droughts, and floods; sites responding to disenfranchised youth, marginalized populations, or diasporas. This research implicates narrative, history, time, memory, cultural identity and meaning. It demands that students, as representatives of the new generation, take a strong personal position on what it means to represent this generation. How can the history and decayed state of permanently scarred sites be proactively used in their rejuvenation? How can the means of rejuvenating a permanently scarred site foster a new way of thinking about the significance of decay and future growth?

Teaching awards
2005 NZ National Award for Sustained Excellence in Tertiary Teaching
2005 Award for Special Academic Achievement
2004 Award for Best Lecturer
2004 Award for Best Course
2003 Award for Best Lecturer
2001 Award for Best Lecturer
2001 Award for Best Tutor
2001 Award for Best Course
2000 Award for Best Tutor
2000 Award for Best Course
1999 Research and Study Fund Award
1999 Award for Special Academic Achievement

For exemplars of Daniel's Lectures and Seminars, see Media on the Mō | About home page of this profile.