Lawrence Bird is a designer, instructor and writer with an interest in the relationship between cities and their mediated image. His current activity is the postdoctoral project Beyond the Desert of the Real. This project elicits narratives from city residents in response to desolate urban sites, and uses these as a point of departure for urban landscape interventions. He makes films, and is currently developing a hybrid film and animation project WPG POV. He is also helping organize the University of Manitoba’s interdisciplinary conference Atmosphere 2011: Mediated Cities.

Bird holds a PhD in History and Theory of Architecture (McGill, 2009), an M.Sc. in City Design and Social Science (London, 2000), and a professional degree in architecture (McGill, 1991). His dissertation concerned the Metropolis narrative cycle (Fritz Lang, 1926; Osamu Tezuka, 1949; Rintaro, 2001). His research has been funded by Canada’s Social Science and Humanities Research Council, Québec’s Fonds québécois de la recherche sur la société et la culture, and the Japanese Ministry of Education (Monbusho). He has worked in and taught architecture, urban design, design theory and drawing in the UK, the USA, Japan, and Canada.

Bird lives in Winnipeg, Manitoba, and continues to be fascinated by the knot of social conditions, urban geography, history and creative arts that binds this city.