Liz McCormick
Liz McCormick
McCormick is a licensed architect, educator, and researcher whose work explores healthy, climatically sensitive, and contextually appropriate building design strategies that connect occupants to the outdoors while also reducing the dependence on mechanical conditioning technologies. Her recent book, Inside OUT: Human Health & the Air-Conditioning Era (Routledge), tells the rich story of both the social and technological drivers of the conditioned indoors while making an argument for thoughtful interventions in the built environment. It brings together a multi-disciplinary group of experts of the indoors, including scientists, anthropologists, engineers, and architects, to discuss the future of human habitation with a dominant focus on human health in a post-pandemic world. Liz is also the lead-PI for the NSF-supported research study abroad program to Tanzania (through 2026).
Liz is a WELL and LEED Accredited Professional and a Certified Passive House Consultant. With over 10 years of experience as a practicing architect, she has worked on a variety of project scales from single-family passive houses to LEED-certified commercial office buildings and campuses. She received a PhD in Design from North Carolina State University, Master of Science in Building Technology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as well as bachelor’s degrees in architecture and fine arts from the Rhode Island School of Design.
Liz was the recipient of the 2021 AIAS/ACSA New Faculty Teaching Award, which “honors architectural educators for exemplary work in areas such as building design, community collaborations, scholarship, and service,” the announcement reads. Liz is also an active member of numerous professional and academic organizations, including the American Institute of Architects (AIA), AIA Charlotte Committee on the Environment (COTE), National Passive House Alliance (PHAUS), the Society of Building Science Educators (SBSE). Additionally, she is an invited board member of the Softwood Lumber Board (SLB) and the president-elect for the Building Technology Educators Society (BTES)
Instagram: Liz_and_her_BS
EXPLORE HER RECENT WORK
McCormick has received a 2021 Buell Center Course Development Prize in Architecture, Climate Change, and Society for her class “High-Performance, Low-Tech.” The prize, which is awarded by Columbia University’s Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture and the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA), recognizes coursework that focuses on the intersections of climate, infrastructure, and architecture.
To explore the hygrothermal behavior of potential enclosure materials and assemblies, McCormick designed and constructed a custom tabletop hotbox, which is easily and affordably replicated. Through extensive testing and biological translation, the result is a repeatable method of exploring natural phenomena and choreographing moisture drive in building materials, as inspired by plant biology.
DIGITALLY DISRUPTIVE CRITICAL REGIONALISM: Climate, Place and Facade The history of the built environment is quite extensive as building typologies have typically evolved slowly over time. The publication where McCormick contributed, deals with the question in relation to the underlying research, how digitally disruptive architecture can contribute to rethink the idea of critical regionalism in response to façade design and climatic conditions.