Julia von Mende

Vita

Julia von Mende is an architectural theorist and has been a research associate (postdoc) at the Institute for European Urban Studies since 2020. Her research interests lie in the interdisciplinary investigation of spatial structures and interrelationships of everyday practices such as eating and the domestic life. 

She studied architecture in Berlin and Copenhagen (1996-2003). In her dissertation project, which she conducted during her research work at the Department for Building Typologies at RWTH Aachen University (2017-2020), she investigated the spatialization of contemporary eating practices. Point of departure for this project was a scientific assistance in the interdisciplinary project "The Anthropocene Kitchen" at the Cluster of Excellence Image Knowledge Design (DFG-funded) at the Humboldt University of Berlin (2013-2016). She has collected teaching experience in architecture and design at the UdK Berlin, the TU Dresden, the Ecole d'Architecture de Paris-Belleville, the HS Sachsen-Anhalt Dessau and the Kunsthochschule Weißensee. Prior to her engagement in the academic field, she was a journalist and editor of the online debate portal BKULT and the architecture journals Arch+ and Daidalos.

Besides conducting research, her responsibilities at the IfEU include teaching, such as fundamentals of scientific work and research methods courses in the study programmes B.Sc. Urbanistik, M.Sc. European Urban Studies and M.Sc. IUDD (WS 20/21), as well as the editorship of the Institute's own publication series (03/2020–08/2021).

During Dr. Lisa Vollmer's parental leave from 03–09/2020, she did the scientifical co-management of the research project Urban Co-Production of Social Rights and Public Welfare – "Städtische Ko-Produktion von Teilhabe und Gemeinwohl. Lokale Aushandlungsprozesse zwischen zivilgesellschaftlichen Akteuren und städtischen Verwaltungen" (2020–2022, funded by the BMBF).

Research interests

  • Architectural theory and -history
  • Practice theory (food and housing practices)
  • Methods of empirical spatial and housing research
  • Urban metabolism