Dr Zoe Latham
Profiles

Dr Zoe Latham

Lecturer

School of Art, Design and Architecture (Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business)

Dr Zoe Latham can be contacted through arrangement with our Press Office, to speak to the media on these areas of expertise.
  • Design
  • Architecture
  • Cultural identity and architecture
  • Landscape
  • Place
  • Perception
  • Film and architecture
Biography

Biography

Biography
Dr Zoe Latham is lecturer and researcher with a background in architectural practice. Her recently completed PhD argues for a re-conceptualisation and extension of place theory within architectural praxis, examining the alignment between place and ritual theory as a way to better understand phenomenon that inform a greater connectivity between embodied, situated and meaningful experiences with the environment. This ritualized connection extends beyond mere doing and evokes cultivation of a deeper sensibility of and towards place. Present here is recognition of the role the body and ritual plays in enabling the formation of this sensibility of place. These theoretical ideas are advanced through various forms of situated and narratological praxes such as autoethnography, storytelling, cognitive mapping and film.
 
Preceding her return to academia, Zoe worked as an architectural designer in New York, concentrating on adaptive reuse, regeneration and conservation of architecture. Prior to working in the USA, Zoe worked in Shenzhen, China for two years; working on high-end interior design, conceptual architectural and landscape design.
 
More resent research engages local communities and environmental groups in a range of participatory workshops relating to understanding and communicating complex place relations can be found at the following link to a visual archive:
 
Position
UG Architecture Ba Yr 1 Module Leader for Design and Communication Modules
UG Architecture Ba Yr 3 Studio Tutor
HKU Space UG Architecture Ba Yr 3 Studio Tutor
PG M Arch Context For Praxis Studio Tutor
 
Other Academic Roles
ADA KE Strategic Group 
 
Past teaching
(2021–2022) University of Plymouth International College Foundation in Architecture, Practical Design Skills, Associate Lecturer
(2019–present) BA (Hons) Architecture Year 1 Communication, Module Leader
(2017–present) BA (Hons) Architecture Year 1 Design Studio, Lecturer
2019 BA (Hons) Architecture Year 1 Design Studio project at Riverside Community Primary School nomination for RIBA MacEwen Award 'Multidisciplinary student team from University of Plymouth turn windswept hill into learning space':
 https://www.ribaj.com/macewen-awards/macewen-awards-2020-university-of-plymouth-students-riverside-community-primary-school-plymouth-outdoor-classroom-firepit
 

Qualifications

(2018–2023) PhD Architecture
(2019) Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
(2016–2018) Master of Architecture with Distinction, University of Plymouth
(2009–2012) BA (Hons) Architecture, University of Plymouth

Roles on external bodies

IALE Europe Early Career Working Group
Research

Research

Other research

Conferences
December 2023. ARCHITECTURE_MEDIA_POLITICS_SOCIETY Conference Local Cultures-Global Spaces. 
May 2023. Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Business Place-Based and Placemaking Research Symposium. Presented Casting a Line to the Land: Narratologies of Embodied Rituals and Connectivity to Place.
2022. RIBA China Chapter Women in Architecture Digital Nexus Exhibition.
September 2021. Festival of Discovery. Futures 21' Voyage of Discovery. Presented and screened 360 Immersive Film 'River Plym from Source to Sea'with Linda Ward
July 2021. AVANCA International Film Conference. Presented 'How might we simulate a riverside experience through virtual collaboration?' a paper and film co-authored with Linda Ward
May 2021. EDRA Just Environments: Presented 'The Dialogics of Tulous: a simultaneous presence and embrace of difference across cultural landscape, heritage and space' a paper co-authored with Prof. Robert Brown and Anqi Dong
September 2019. Test Space: Expositions of practice led research, Plymouth University Fine Art Studios, Royal William Yard. Presented film as auto-ethnographic method entitled 'Embodied Rituals of Fly-fishing'.
September 2019. Flows of Entanglements: how rivers shape identities, University of Plymouth.
Co-convener and participant of methodology roundtable chaired by Professor Owain Jones (Bath Spa University) - presented MPhil/ PhD Methodologies.
May 2019. Rethinking Post Recovery Space, Presented Master of Architecture work with focus Macau flooding.
March 2018. Cultural heritage and social cohesion, Institute for Sociology, Centre for Social Sciences, Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Budapest. Presented paper titled "Shenzhen's Urban Villages: Dialogic cultural landscapes and resilient rituals":
https://socio.hu/index.php/so/article/view/770
  
Awards & Funding
 2023. AHRC IAA Placemaking Impact Funding - Portrait of a Place [£3996]
2023. Architecture Area Research Fund - Digitising Rivers Assembly Mapping + IAA Impact Workshop [£598]
2022. Research / Career Development Fund - Right to the Water Workshop - Public Space or Private Asset? [£108.60]
2019. Flows of entanglements: How Rivers Shape Identity International Conference Co-convenor, School of Art, Design and Architecture, University of Plymouth. [£700]
 
Community Activities
September 2023. Ode to the Sea. Hosted 'Sea Pools' book launch, research dissemination event.
September 2023. River Collective River Dart Festival. 
March 2023. Rivers Assembly. Designing and facilitating interactive mapping of social and environmental projects along local rivers for Sustainable SouthHams.
June 2022. The Right to Water: Public Space or Private Asset? Co-hosted workshop to explore current issues and debates associated with access and the ‘right to water’.
 
Research groups
https://www.plymouth.ac.uk/research/urban-dialogues
https://www.plymouth.ac.uk/research/environmental-cultures
https://lex.landscaperesearch.org/profiles/zoe-latham/
Award nominations
http://www.presidentsmedals.com/Entry-46411?fbclid=IwAR3dSj16B9V1IQ5tJAaAtlPuASlpLAAzLwe7sf2hHgjplB2x9yNKZKZtQDs
https://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/practice/students/aj-student-prize-2018-university-of-plymouth
https://www.archiprix.org/2021/projects/4449
 
Publications

Publications

Key publications

Key publications are highlighted

Journals
Articles
Latham Z & Ward L (2021) 'How might we simulate a riverside experience through virtual collaboration?' AVANCA | CINEMA 950-956 , DOI Open access
Brown R & Warwick P (2021) 'Community Campus as Threshold: A Space of Dialogue for Academia and the Community' Journal of Dialogue Studies (9) 70-96 Publisher Site , DOI Open access
Latham Z & Brown R (2018) 'Shenzhen’s Urban Villages: Dialogic cultural landscapes and resilient rituals' Socio.hu Social Science Review (Special Issue No. 6) , DOI Open access
Books
Fletcher M (2020) Visual Communication for Architects and Designers Constructing the Persuasive Presentation. Routledge
Designs
Visual Communication for Architects and Designers: Constructing the Persuasive Presentation.
Presentations and posters
Brown R & Latham Z Brown R & Latham Z 'Beyond Blade Runner: A dialogic of the everyday in Macau's fictional landscape' Open access
Other Publications
Latham Z (2020) Casting a line to place: embodied rituals, cultural landscapes and their potential to (re)connect. https://lex.wpcreative.io/content/casting-a-line-to-place-embodied-rituals-cultural-landscapes-and-their-potential-to-reconnect/
Latham ZE (2019) Architecture and Place. https://secularliturgies.wordpress.com/2019/03/30/architecture-and-place-by-zoe-latham/?fbclid=IwAR2xn494gATgkRflGgi5bBt54OIwg3TsUt7xrxoch0LpwAJRm4UbfzztwhA Secular Liturgies
Latham ZE (2018) Casting a Line to the Land.