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Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍

@williamtozer.bsky.social

1.2K followers 450 following 980 posts

Critic, educator, researcher, architect | Posting daily about architecture | Bartlett UCL PhD | also studied RMIT, University of Auckland | Founder of William Tozer Associates @williamtozerassoc.bsky.social

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Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · Nov 14

A very short bio, for this new platform:

I’m an architect with my own practice—studio is in London, but some projects are elsewhere.

I’ve taught in the UK and US, and written for architectural journals like ARQ, industry magazines like Detail and Monument, and a number of lifestyle publications.

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Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 12h

Most Y*MBYs will consider this just a foot in the door. It was always a counterproductive moniker, and it’s become toxic—time to retire it.

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 12h

Seems like a misread to say that this is a Y*MBY win. If the Y*MBY movement was focused on tactical high density housing around transport hubs, they’d have much broader support. Upzoning everywhere and letting the market decide is the Y*MBY platform.

www.dwell.com/article/what...

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 1d

‘Tucked between joists above the ceilings are packs of BioPCM, an engineered wax that melts as it absorbs heat when the interiors are sultry, and solidifies, releasing warmth, as the rooms turn cold.’

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/26/r...

A Secret Sauce Keeps This Australian House Hot and Cool

www.nytimes.com

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 2d

‘For his part, Judd hated most architects. . . . Yet, when it came to trying to realise buildings himself, he would learn that the quest for pure autonomy of form, and his trademark flawlessness, wasn’t so easy.’

www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

Leaky roofs, collapsed walls, mega debts: when art’s master minimalist Donald Judd tried architecture

Weary of the New York scene, and keen to focus on architecture, the artist started buying up properties to play with in a tiny Texas town. Trouble was, he couldn’t stop. We take the tour of his Marfa ...

www.theguardian.com

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 2d

I mean, I hate L-shaped kitchens because of the dead corner they create, but this is *not* the solution . . .
Crocodile Dundee voice: That’s not a dead corner—*this* is a dead corner. . .

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 3d

‘The problem isn’t the planning system. It’s a broken, profit-driven housing model that banks land and starves supply. Scrapping nature protections won’t build 1.5m homes, it will just bulldoze public trust and the countryside.’

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

The Guardian view on Labour targeting nature: the problem isn’t snails, but a broken housing model | Editorial

Editorial: Rachel Reeves’s drive to speed up development is beginning to treat wildlife and the environment as expendable. Voters want homes built, but not at any cost

www.theguardian.com

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Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 10d

‘A government spokesperson said: “The chancellor and the housing secretary are working together to reform the outdated planning system that’s been holding this country back – so we can build the 1.5m homes hardworking people need . . .”’

www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

Ministers to announce significant changes to UK’s planning system

Exclusive: Differences over changes to environmental and legal provisions to prompt economic growth hint at chaos at heart of government

www.theguardian.com

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 13d

Never was so little said by so many, for so long.

#architecturepresentations

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 14d

‘He filed his first architectural patent in the late 1920s, several years before similar experiments by his better-known countryman Jean Prouvé’

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/01/r...

In a Spanish Vineyard, an Unsung Engineer Finally Gets a Toast

www.nytimes.com

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 15d

‘For decades, the prototypical dream house was one you would hardly need to leave . . . Today, many Americans would say that their dream house is simply one they can afford.‘

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/08/r...

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 16d

Really?! That’s a pretty wild interpretation of that rule.

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Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 17d

‘Within the OECD, only Canada boasts a similar project, having recently launched its Housing Design Catalogue, offering 50 preapproved templates for terraces and townhouses.’

www.theguardian.com/artanddesign...

Australia has a $1 solution for the global housing crisis: a pattern book of architecturally designed homes

The NSW Housing Pattern Book is part of a broader push to densify cities without resorting to high-rise towers – and it has struck a chord well beyond Australia

www.theguardian.com

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 20d

Loos was my doctoral subject, and that research informs a lot of what our practice does, but it was particularly satisfying to explore this further, even if we didn’t get shortlisted.

WILLIAM TOZER Associates @williamtozerassoc.bsky.social · 20d

Our Powers of Ten competition entry is featured in the RIBA Journal.

The actual space we’ve designed will be familiar to anyone who’s experienced the mirrored illusion of space created by Loos’s Kärntner Bar, particularly after a few drinks.

www.ribaj.com/products/wes...

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 21d

‘On average, Type Five projects cost about $550 per square foot, including site work. That figure is competitive in the Bay Area, where new builds easily price out at $800 per square foot without site preparation.’

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/29/r...

The Architect Liked the Model House So Much, He Moved In

www.nytimes.com

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 22d

‘What the Floor Plans for Famous Sitcom Homes Might’ve Looked Like IRL’

www.dwell.com/article/floo...

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 23d

‘built in three weeks or less by a 4.75-ton industrial printer that poured both its exterior and interior walls with lavacrete, a proprietary material made from pulverized red lava rock, cement and water that is squeezed out in layers’

www.nytimes.com/2025/09/05/r...

‘Can You Print a House?’: God, Robots and the U.S. Housing Crisis

www.nytimes.com

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 24d

We need more developers like Eichler.

www.wallpaper.com/architecture...

A restored Eichler home is for sale

Explore a peerless piece of West Coast midcentury modernism

www.wallpaper.com

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 26d

I was very encouraged that this approach will increasingly allow this to happen.

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 27d

Ian Moore’s lecture thoughtfully chose a selection of projects to illustrate a particular theme in his work, identified a number of repeated elements of his design strategy, and followed their development and permutations. Refreshingly self-reflective.

www.nzia.co.nz/explore/news...

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 28d

Great lecture about the work being done by the UK government’s Head Architect, and her office, to foster great architectural design through changes to planning policy and processes.

architecturenow.co.nz/articles/uk-...

UK Government Architect to visit Aotearoa

Sarah Allan, the UK government’s chief architect, will be delivering public lectures in Auckland on 17 September and in Dunedin on 24 September.

architecturenow.co.nz

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Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · 29d

£895k for your own Smithsons building . . .

themodernhouse.com/sales-list/u...

For Sale: Upper Lawn, Tisbury, Wiltshire | The Modern House

Widely considered as one of the most significant examples of modern architecture, Upper Lawn was designed by the late architects and celebrated pioneers of brutalism, Alison and Peter Smithson. Rooted...

themodernhouse.com

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Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · Sep 16

I was fortunate to meet Sir Nicholas Grimshaw once. A charming person, who seemed to take a genuine interest in everyone he spoke with. What a career and life he had.

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · Sep 15

LinkedIn accidentally being funny.

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · Sep 15

There are so many ways the NZ real estate industry likes to hide sale prices. From ubiquitous auctions, through delayed and obfuscated publishing of sale prices, to off-market sales. Not sure this ‘cheap stuff’ will look so cheap soon though.

Dr William Tozer | RIBA ANZIA 📍 @williamtozer.bsky.social · Sep 15

It’s in the interests of the banks to make houses cost as much as possible. They get roughly whatever that number is in interest over the course of loan. Deciding what they’ll lend is basically choosing what their own profit will be on the transaction.

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