Island Editions: Peter Eisenman + Nader Tehrani

In celebration of the Gensler Family AAP NYC Center's relocation to Cornell Tech's Tata Innovation Center on Roosevelt Island, join us on campus for a remarkable series of conversations with some of architecture's leading practitioners, hosted by architect Peter Eisenman (B.Arch. '55) and critic Cynthia Davidson.

The Fall 2025 series kicked off with Eisenman in dialogue with New York–based, Swiss-French architect Bernard Tschumi (October 21, 7 pm). The series continued with Steven Holl (November 12). Eisenman's conversation with Nader Tehrani (December 2) wraps up the Fall events.

The series continues in the Spring 2026 semester, with Cynthia Davidson in conversation with Elizabeth Diller, Toshiko Mori, and AAP Dean Meejin Yoon (B.Arch '95). Dates TBD.

The series is free and open to the public. Registration required. One registration per attendee.

For updates, please follow us on Eventbrite, Instagram @CornellAAP @CornellAAPNYC. If you would like to be notified when tickets for forthcoming events are released, please fill out this form: https://forms.gle/CvBamU7SfDtxkQ1EA.

About the Speakers

Nader Tehrani

Principal, NADAAA

For his contributions to architecture as an art, Nader Tehrani is the recipient of The American Academy of Arts and Letters' 2020 Arnold W. Brunner Memorial Prize. Tehrani has also been named the 2022 National Design Awards Design Visionary by Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum, honored for his innovation and impact on the field of architecture.

Working on interdisciplinary platforms, Tehrani's research has been focused on the transformation of the building industry, innovative material applications, and the development of new means and methods of construction, as exemplified in his work with digital fabrication. His work has received many prestigious awards, among which are an unprecedented eighteen Progressive Architecture Awards. His works have been widely exhibited at MoMA, LA MOCA, and ICA Boston. His work is also part of the permanent collection of the Canadian Center for Architecture and the Nasher Sculpture Center. Tehrani is the former Dean of The Cooper Union's Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture, where he served from 2015–22, and former head of the Department of Architecture at the MIT School of Architecture and Planning, where he served from 2010–14.

Tehrani has taught at the Harvard Graduate School of Design; Rhode Island School of Design; the Georgia Institute of Technology, where he served as the Thomas W. Ventulett III Distinguished Chair in Architectural Design; and The University of Toronto, where he served as the Frank O. Gehry International Visiting Chair in Architecture. He also served as the William A. Bernoudy Architect in Residence at the American Academy in Rome.

Peter Eisenman

Founder and Principal, Eisenman Architects; Visiting Critic, Cornell AAP

Peter Eisenman (B.Arch. '55), an internationally recognized architect and educator, is founder and design principal of Eisenman Architects, an architecture and design office in New York City. He is also a Visiting Critic at Cornell University's Gensler Family AAP NYC Center (AAP NYC).

Award-winning projects by Eisenman Architects include the Wexner Center for the Arts and Fine Arts Library at The Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio; the Koizumi Sangyo Corporation headquarters building in Tokyo; and in Berlin, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe and IBA Housing at Checkpoint Charlie, each of which received a National Honor Award for Design from the American Institute of Architects.

Eisenman is also a distinguished author and teacher. Among his many books are Written Into the Void: Selected Writings, 1990–2004 (Yale University Press, 2007) and Ten Canonical Buildings, 1950–2000 (Rizzoli, 2008), which examines the work of ten architects since 1950. His new book, Rewriting Alberti (MIT Press, October 2025), with contributions by Pier Vittorio Aureli, Mario Carpo, and Daniel Sherer, will be presented at AAP NYC on Thursday, November 6.

Eisenman holds a B.Arch. from Cornell University, a M.S. in architecture from Columbia University, and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Cambridge University. He holds an honorary doctorate of fine arts from the University of Illinois at Chicago, Pratt Institute, Syracuse University, and the Brera Academy of Art in Milan; and an honorary doctorate in architecture from the Università La Sapienza in Rome.