Keywords

Robotic Fabrication, Generative Design, Artificial Intelligence, Multi-Agent Systems, Collective Robotic Construction.

Biography

Robert Stuart-Smith is Associate Professor of Architecture and Design Computing[RS1] , Director of the Digital Building Laboratory, and Steward of the Chuck Eastman Doctoral Fellowship Fund at the Georgia Institute of Technology. He also leads the Autonomous Manufacturing Lab, established across GT's School of Architecture and University College London's Department of Computer Science, where he has served as Principal Research Associate. His research has been supported by more than $5.8 million in competitive funding, with industry partners including Cemex, Skanska, and Buro Happold.

Prior to joining Georgia Tech, Stuart-Smith was faculty in Architecture and Affiliate Faculty in Engineering's GRASP Laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania, where he established an advanced robotic fabrication facility and founded and directed the Master of Science in Design: Robotics & Autonomous Systems (MSD-RAS), a post-professional degree integrating artificial intelligence, robotic fabrication, and architecture. He has also taught at the AA School of Architecture in London and held several international visiting appointments.

His academic research is informed by extensive professional practice: Stuart-Smith directed Robert Stuart-Smith Design and was a founding partner of Kokkugia, following experience at Grimshaw, LAB Architecture Studio, and the engineering firm Arup. His work is held in the permanent collection of the Frac Centre-Val de Loire, has been exhibited at the Venice, Tallinn, Beijing, and Prague architecture biennales, and featured by BBC Click, New Scientist, and Smithsonian. He is the author of Behavioural Production: Semi-Autonomous Approaches to Architectural Design, Robotic Fabrication and Collective Robotic Construction and editor of Robotic Fabrication & Architectural Design.

Education

PhD Architecture, RMIT University, Australia, expected 2026

MA Architecture (Post-Professional), Architectural Association School of Architecture, London, UK, 2008

BA Architecture (Royal Australian Institute of Architects Top Graduating Student Medallion), University of Canberra, Australia, 2001

BA Applied Science in Environmental Design, University of Canberra, Australia, 1998

Statement of Teaching Interest

Stuart-Smith develops research-led curricula that prepare students to operate critically and creatively at the intersection of design, technology, and making. His courses teach integrated approaches to architectural design and robotic manufacturing, in which fabrication becomes a design medium rather than a constraint. This approach spans large-format robotic and additive manufacturing, artificial intelligence and computational design, collective robotic construction, and design-build. Through these, students gain the technical fluency and design judgment to shape emerging modes of architectural production rather than merely apply them.

Statement of Research Interest

Stuart-Smith's research integrates artificial intelligence, robotic fabrication, and collective robotic construction to transform how the built environment is designed and constructed — improving productivity, reducing material waste, and enabling scalable, mass-customized architecture with expanded aesthetic possibilities. Central to this agenda is a semi-autonomous approach to design, fabrication, and construction that preserves architectural authorship, user participation, and contextual negotiation while addressing challenges such as housing undersupply and the resource demands of the built environment.

This research develops generative design methods — spanning multi-agent systems, deep reinforcement learning, diffusion models, and material physics simulation — that operate directly on three-dimensional architectural representations and integrate with custom robotic fabrication and construction workflows. Flagship projects include TopoForm, combining generative topology, structural optimization, and visual character evaluation for additively manufactured building elements; Cyclops, a site-adaptive AI design framework leveraging machinic perception and 3D scan data; AMX, an adaptive, non-planar robotic additive manufacturing software; and foundational contributions to collective robotic construction, published in Nature and Science Robotics — including the first physical demonstrations of Aerial Additive Manufacturing. These methods are validated through full-scale demonstrators such as Striae, a pair of additively manufactured wall systems. They also inform Siteless House, a design research collaboration with Cemex Global R&D, the University of Pennsylvania, and others, which explores low-impact, deployable housing for underutilized urban land through an ultra-thin, fiber-reinforced precast concrete shell, robotically fabricated formwork, and circular material strategies including design for disassembly.

Together, this research advances a design-led, AI-augmented, and materially grounded model of architecture — supporting differentiated, low-waste, and situated building across production scales.

Selected Publications

Books:

Stuart-Smith, R. Behavioural Production: Semi-Autonomous Approaches to Architectural Design, Robotic Fabrication and Collective Robotic Construction. (Taylor & Francis, 2024).

Stuart-Smith, R (Ed). Robotic Fabrication and Architectural Design (ORO Editions, 2024).

Proceedings:

Akbarzadeh, M., Aviv, D., Jamelle, H. & Stuart-Smith, R. (eds), ACADIA 2022 Hybrids and Haecceities: Proceedings of the 42nd Annual Conference of the Association for Computer Aided Design in Architecture. (IngramSpark, Philadelphia, 2023)

Akbarzadeh, M., Aviv, D., Jamelle, H. & Stuart-Smith, R. (eds), ACADIA 2022 Hybrids and Haecceities: Projects of the 42nd Annual Conference of the Association for Computer Aided Design in Architecture. (IngramSpark, Philadelphia, 2022)

Selected Journal Papers:

Y. F. Kaya, L. Orr, B. B. Kocer, V. M. Pawar, R. Stuart-Smith, M. Kovac. Aerial Additive Manufacturing: Towards Onsite Building Construction with Aerial Robots. Science Robotics 10, (101), eado6251 (2024)

Zhang, K., Chermprayong, P., Xiao, F., Tzoumanikas, D., Dams, B., Kay, S., Kocer, B. B., Burns, A., Orr, L., Choi, C., Darekar, D. D., Li, W., Hirschmann, S., Soana, V., Ngah, S. A., Sareh, S., Choubey, A., Margheri, L., Pawar, V. M, Ball, R., Williams, C., Shepherd,P., Leutenegger, S., Stuart-Smith, R. & Kovac, M. Aerial additive manufacturing with multiple autonomous robots. Nature 609, 709–717 (2022)

Petersen, K. H., Napp, N., Stuart-Smith, R., Rus, D. & Kovac, M. A review of collective robotic construction. Science Robotics 4, (2019)

Pawar, V. M., Stuart-Smith, R., & Scully, P. Toward autonomous architecture: The convergence of digital design, robotics, and the built environment. Science Robotics 2, eaan3686 (2017)

Stuart-Smith, R. Behavioural Production: Autonomous Swarm-Constructed Architecture. Architectural Design 86, 54–59 (2016)

Selected Book Chapters:

King, N. & Stuart-Smith, R. “Pedagogical Approaches to Digital Material Systems” in Claying Architecture: Making Machine and Material Kin. (eds. Doyle, S., Melendez, F., Van Dyck, K., Murphy, J., Scelsa, A.) 98-105 (Routledge, 2026)

Stuart-Smith, R. A Multifarious, Anisotropic, Material Agency: Speculations on Additive Manufactured Architecture. in Design Technology and Digital Production: An Architecture Anthology (ed. Esquivel, G.) 75–80 (Taylor & Francis, 2024)

Stuart-Smith, R. Foreword. in Building Futures: Technology, Ecology, and Architectural Practice (Garber, R.) 11–19 (Wiley, 2023)

Selected Conference Papers:

Stuart-Smith, R., Darekar, D., Danahy, P., Bahadir Kocer, B., Pawar, V., & Kovac, M. Collective Aerial Additive Manufacturing and Incrementally Built Shell Structure Design. in ACADIA 2022 Hybrids and Haecceities: Proceedings of the 42nd Annual Conference of the Association for Computer Aided Design in Architecture (eds. Akbarzadeh, M., Aviv, D., Jamelle, H. & Stuart-Smith, R.) 244–255 (IngramSpark, Philadelphia, 2023)

Stuart-Smith, R. & Danahy, P. Visual Character Analysis Within Algorithmic Design, Quantifying Aesthetics Relative To Structural And Geometric Design Criteria. in CAADRIA 2022, POST-CARBON - Proceedings of the 27th CAADRIA Conference - vol. 1, Sydney, 9-15 April 2022 (eds. van Ameijde, J., Gardner, N., Hyun, K. H., Luo, D. & Sheth, U.) 131–140 (Sydney, 2022). doi:10.52842/conf.caadria.2022.1.131 [Best Presentation Award]

Sustarevas, J., Benjamin Tan, K. X., Gerber, D., Stuart-Smith, R. & Pawar, V. M. YouWasps: Towards Autonomous Multi-Robot Mobile Deposition for Construction. in IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) (ed. IEEE Staff) 2320–2327 (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), 2019). doi:10.1109/IROS40897.2019.8967766

Sustarevas, J., Butters, D., Hammid, M., Pawar, V. M., Dwyer, G., & Stuart-Smith, R. MAP - A Mobile Agile Printer Robot for on-site Construction. in 2018 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS) (ed. IEEE Staff) 2441–2448 (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), 2018). doi:10.1109/iros.2018.8593815

Selected Honors & Awards

ACADIA 2025 Conference Best Paper Award for “MonoMatSkin: A Circular Robotic Multi-Tool Approach To Doubly-Curved Mono-Material Panel For Reversible Assemblies”, 2025

Honored Listee in Marquis Who’s Who, 2025

RMIT University Research Stipend Scholarship, 2022

Australian Government Research Training Program Scholarship, 2022

Best Presentation Award - Runner Up, CAADRIA 2022 Conference, 2022

Royal College of Art Design Innovation Award: Robert Stuart-Smith Design Ltd, 2014

Kokkugia project models and drawings acquired for FRAC Permanent Collection, 2013