Filiz Klassen, Ryerson University

Profile photo of Filiz Klassen, expert at Ryerson University

Founder & Co-Director, Ryerson Design Fabrication Zone Professor Toronto, Ontario fklassen@torontomu.ca Office: (416) 979-5000 ext. 556937

Bio/Research

Over the past decade, Professor Filiz Klassen’s research umbrella and experimental prototypes evolved from integrating material innovations in built environments in a meaningful way towards materiality as ‘responsive matter’ in interiors and allied fields. The notion of active building materialit...

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Bio/Research

Over the past decade, Professor Filiz Klassen’s research umbrella and experimental prototypes evolved from integrating material innovations in built environments in a meaningful way towards materiality as ‘responsive matter’ in interiors and allied fields. The notion of active building materiality focusing on adaptability to variables in environmental conditions continue to be her long-term laboratory for making. Professor Klassen continues to challenge the widely accepted perception of material physicality as simply ‘add-on’ or ‘ornamental’, in an effort to debate and lessen the impact of architecture and interiors on climate change in her research and teaching.


Professor Klassen presented​ her ​research on material innovations and responsive built environments in many national/ international conferences and published in books; Snow, Rain, Light, Wind: Weathering Architecture, Arium: Weather + Architecture, Mobile Nation and Transportable Environments 3, as well as many other academic and professional journals. Professor Klassen received funding from Toronto Metropolitan University , other external and government funding agencies such as the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) Research/Creation Grant for her research project Malleable Matter: Material Innovations in Architecture. This grant led to the Snow, Rain, Light, Wind: Weathering Architecture Exhibition as well as performances at Harbourfront Centre HATCH Emerging Performance Projects and at Gladstone 'Come Up to My Room'​ Annual Exhibition (Funded by ​Ontario Arts Council, Integrated Project Grant). Other in-kind services and grant contributions were received from Toronto Metropolitan University, Cambridge Galleries (Cambridge), Triangle Gallery (Calgary), Gladstone Hotel, and Harbourfront Center (Toronto) as well as 3M CanadaTM.

Professor Klassen is the founder of the Design Fabrication Zone (DFZ), an interdisciplinary hub for design/fabrication innovation and entrepreneurship at The Creative School.


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