Eva Franch i Gilabert
Eva Franch i Gilabert is a Catalan architect, curator and educator who was the first female director of London's Architectural Association School of Architecture from July 2018 until she was controversially fired in July 2020.Career
Eva Franch i Gilabert grew up in Deltebre, a town southwest of Barcelona in Catalonia, working in her mother's hair salon before leaving to study architecture in Barcelona and Delft. It is said a potential career as a figure skater had been cut short by injury at the age of 17, after which Franch studied architecture, winning a fellowship at Princeton University in 2006, and continuing her career in the United States.
Franch has taught at the Cooper Union School of Architecture, Columbia University GSAPP, the IUAV University of Venice, SUNY Buffalo, and Rice University School of Architecture. In 2004, she established her own architectural practice, Office of Architectural Affairs.
From 2010 to 2018 Franch was chief curator and executive director of the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York. In 2014 she was selected by the US State Department to represent the United States at the XIV Venice Biennale with the project OfficeUS, an experimental think tank for architecture practice.
She was appointed - from a three-strong shortlist - as permanent director of the Architectural Association in London in 2018.
Following votes of no confidence in her leadership, Franch was fired in July 2020 for "failure to develop and implement a strategy and maintain the confidence of the AA School Community which were specific failures of performance against clear objectives outlined in the original contract of employment." Her dismissal came despite support from academics who wrote an open letter talking of "systemic biases" against women and of sexism, and accusing the AA of using "the pandemic for anti-democratic purposes". Architectural magazine Dezeen reported tutor and alumni views that the failure to investigate allegations of bullying and sexism had damaged both the AA school and the architecture profession, leaving "a cloud over the school".
