Thorsten Klooster

Thorsten Klooster is an architect in Berlin and the editor of the book Smart Surfaces—And Their Application in Architecture and Design. He is a former member of the Technical Science Research Group at the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Systems and Design Technology in Berlin. From 2002–07, he was a design instructor at the Brandenburg University of Technology, where his research areas included new materials and functional surfaces. In 2007 he founded the firm TASK Architekten in Berlin. He has presented workshops and lectures at Akademie Schloss Solitude in Stuttgart, Università IUAV in Venice, and the University of Michigan, among other institutions. He is currently a referee for the 2013 IBA Hamburg’s “Smart Material Houses” competition. Since 2009, he and Heike Klussmann have headed the BlingCrete working group at the University of Kassel, which is devoted to the experimental development of new material concepts, with an emphasis on the functional design of concrete surfaces. BlingCrete brings together experts from the fields of visual art, architecture, interaction design, industrial design, experimental physics, and materials research, and is funded by the AIF industrial research group.