Dr. Christian Dimmer is Associate Professor for Urban Studies at Waseda University’s School of International Liberal Studies, where he teaches courses on 'Transition Design', ‘Urban Commons’, ‘Theories of Placemaking and Urban Practice (commonly known as Planning Theory)’. ‘Sustainable Cities and resilient Communities’, 'Politics of Public Space,' as well as ‘Global Urbanism.’
He graduated from the interdisciplinary ‘Spatial and Environmental Planning’ program at the Technical University of Kaierslautern/ Germany with his graduation project comparing different 'cultures of public space' in the USA, Germany and Japan. He was supervised by Prof. Markus NEPPL and Prof. Bernd STREICH and also studied under Alber SPEER *junior*.
Besides his academic work he has cooperated with numerous planning and environmental consultancies in Germany and with architectural firms such as Arata Isozaki and Associates or property developers like Mitsubishi Estate Inc. in Japan. He functioned as urban design and placemaking consultant for large-scale urban regneration schemes in central Tokyo as well as on various new town projects in China. In 2006 he established the architectural and design practice Frontoffice/ Tokyo together with Koen Klinkers, William Galloway, and Erez Golani Solomon.
Christian has earned his PhD in Urban Engineering from the University of Tokyo with his dissertation ‘[Re]negotiating Public Space: a Historical Critique of Modern Public Space in Metropolitan Japan and its Contemporary Re-valuation’ under the supervision of Prof. NISHIMURA Yukio and Prof. KITAZAWA Takeru.
As a JSPS (Japan Society for the Promotion of Science) post-doctoral research fellow he was affiliated with the Interfaculty Initiative in Information Studies at the University of Tokyo, where he examined the 'Politics and Contestations of Public Space in post-growth metropolitan Japan'. This project was carried out in cooperation with his research host Prof. YOSHIMI Shunya.
Christian has worked as assistant-professor for Urban Design at the University of Tokyo, where he taught post-graduate courses on 'Advanced Urban Studies' as well as 'Dissertation Writing.'
He is co-founder of the charitable, design-led disaster response organisation, Open Architecture Collaborative｜Tokyo Chapter, the Alliance of Humanitarian Architecture｜Sendai, as well as of the TPF²｜Tohoku Planning Forum, which facilitates the exchange of ideas, projects and initiatives for rebuilding resilient, liveable, sustainable communities in the disaster-hit areas of Tohoku in north-eastern Japan.
Specialties: urbanism, urban theory, planning theory, urban governance, new urban commons, public space, civil society, sustainable cities, adaptive cities, resilient cities, citizen participation
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