Werner Sobek

Former Director, Institute for Lightweight Structures & Conceptual Design (ILEK), University of Stuttgart, Germany

Werner Sobek

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    4th Holcim Forum 2013 on “Economy of Sustainable Construction”

    Werner Sobek is Director, Institute for Lightweight Structures & Conceptual Design (ILEK), University of Stuttgart, Germany; Founder of the Werner Sobek Group; and a member of the Global Holcim Awards jury in 2018.

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    4th Forum in Mumbai, India 2013: Concluding debate discussing workshop findings (l-r): Rolf Soiron (moderator), Ashok Lall, Werner Sobek, Nirmal Kishnani & Marc Angélil.

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    Global Holcim Foundation Awards 2012

    Presenting the Holcim Innovation 2nd prize for "Low-cost apartments incorporating smart materials", Hamburg, Germany (l-r, foreground): Werner Sobek, member of the Global Holcim Awards jury and Director of ILEK, University of Stuttgart congratulates prize-winner Mike Schlaich, TU Berlin with Uli Hellweg, CEO of IBA Hamburg (l-r, background): Alexander Hückler, Frank Barkow, and Heiko Krech.

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    Global Holcim Foundation Awards 2012 jury

    Werner Sobek (left), Director of the Institute for Lightweight Structures and Conceptual Design (ILEK) at the University of Stuttgart, Germany and Rahul Mehrotra, Principal, Rahul Mehrotra Associates, India at the Global Holcim Awards jury meeting in Zurich, 2012.

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    3rd Holcim Forum 2010 Re-inventing Construction

    Keynote speaker: Werner Sobek presents his keynote address “Reduce to the max” at the 3rd International Holcim Forum for Sustainable Construction – “Re-inventing Construction” held at the Universidad Iberoamericana, Mexico City in 2010.

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    Holcim Roundtable 2014

    Alejandro Aravena (l), Executive Director, Elemental (Chile) and Werner Sobek, Director, Institute for Lightweight Structures and Conceptual Design (ILEK), University of Stuttgart (Germany), at the inaugural Holcim Roundtable held at MIT Endicott House, Boston, MA, USA in 2014.

Werner Sobek was Director, Institute for Lightweight Structures & Conceptual Design (ILEK), University of Stuttgart, Germany; Founder of the Werner Sobek Group; and a member of the Global Holcim Foundation Awards jury in 2012 and 2018.

Last updated: May 08, 2024 Stuttgart, Germany

Werner Sobek presented a keynote address and co-presented the workshop “Reduce CO2 – With technology to zero emissions” at the 3rd Holcim Forum 2010. He participated in the Concluding Debate at the 4th Holcim Forum 2013 on “Economy of Sustainable Construction” and presented “We have to be more radical” at the inaugural Holcim Roundtable 2014. He was a workshop moderator for “Changing paradigms: Materials for a world not yet built” at the 6th Holcim Forum 2019 held in Cairo, Egypt.

For more than three decades, Werner Sobek researched and taught at various universities around the world about how we can make our built environment more sustainable and at the same time breathtakingly beautiful. He marked his retirement from active work at the University of Stuttgart with the farewell lecture “The Boundary Conditions of the Future” in May 2023. He considered the possibilities architects, engineers and designers already have today to cope with the challenges ahead of us such as climate change, dwindling resources and demographic change – and what still needs to change?

The Institute for Lightweight Structures & Conceptual Design (ILEK) specializes on research into new materials and concepts for lightweight and adaptive structures. The Werner Sobek Group engages in innovative engineering combined with the design of constructional elements and sophisticated concepts for sustainable buildings.

Werner Sobek studied architecture and structural engineering at the University of Stuttgart. As successor to architect Frei Otto and engineer Jörg Schlaich, Werner Sobek advocates a unique approach of bringing architects and engineers together, both during their training and in their professional activities. He is the former president of the Board of the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Nachhaltiges Bauen).