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Draft:Albert Williamson-Taylor

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Albert Williamson-Taylor
NationalityBritish
OccupationEngineer
Engineering career
DisciplineStructural engineer
InstitutionsFellow of the Institution of Structural Engineers, Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects
Practice nameAKT II
AwardsIStructE Gold Medal 2023

Albert Williamson-Taylor (born 1959) is a British-West-African structural engineer, and the 2023 recipient of the Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE) Gold Medal.[1]. He is most prominently a co-founder and design director of the London-based engineering practice AKT II, which he formed in 1996 (originally as Adams Kara Taylor) alongside fellow engineers Robin Adams and Hanif Kara[2].

Early life and education

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Williamson-Taylor was born in 1959 in London to Nigerian parents. His family then moved to Nigeria in 1960, where he attended preschool in Lagos. They then moved to Sierra Leone, where he attended state school in Freetown and then in Kono (amidst the country’s diamond-conflict region), as a result of his father’s governmental work. Williamson-Taylor then returned to the UK in 1976 to study with Brunel Technical College, and then with Bradford University, where in 1983 he became one of the first two recipients of the university’s new master's degree in structural engineering[3]. Throughout his further and higher education, Williamson-Taylor additionally worked variously as a chef, a site labourer, a hospitality doorman (bouncer), and an overnight factory worker, while also tutoring younger engineering students and mentoring local youth offenders.

Career

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Williamson-Taylor initially worked for the firms Price & Myers and Anthony Hunt Associates[4]. He then co-founded AKT II[5] and has since overseen all of the practice’s work as the principal design director with responsibility for technical management[6]. As of 2023, AKT II’s work has been recognised with more than 400 design awards, with four projects that have received the RIBA Stirling Prize[7]

Notable projects

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Academia

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Since 2011, Williamson-Taylor has taught with London’s Architectural Association School of Architecture (the AA)[8], where he leads the engineering tutoring for the master-level architecture course within the institution’s avant-garde Design Research Laboratory department[9].

Awards, honours and recognitions

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Williamson-Taylor is a Fellow of the Institution of Structural Engineers (IStructE)[10] and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA)[11]. He is a trustee of the charity Open City[12], and a trustee of the international architecture school African Futures Institute (AFI)[13]. He has also served as a design review panellist for the London borough of Southwark and Newham.

Personal life

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Taekwondo

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Williamson-Taylor holds a fifth-degree blackbelt in Taekwondo. While studying in Bradford, he helped to set up the university’s first Taekwondo club in 1979, which (at the time of the 1970s Bradford murders) became the largest martial arts club in both the university and town. Following his graduation, he then opened a martial arts club in the Wood Green area of North London in 1983[14] (in the wake of the 1981 Wood Green riots[15]), with the stipulation that young members must concurrently be working towards a university education if they wish to train. Later that same year, he also co-founded the Taekwondo Association of Great Britain, and then in 1993 was involved in founding the UK-based association Global Taekwondo International (GTI)[16]. Williamson-Taylor then became the GTI’s black-belt champion in the English/British Lightweight league for five years[17]. He was also a member of the Southern England demonstration team, and he participated in the first International Taekwon-Do Federation (ITF) world championship[18].

Family

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Williamson-Taylor is married to an adoption-consultant social worker. He has four children.

Reference

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  1. ^ "Albert Williamson-Taylor is named as IStructE Gold Medallist 2023 - the Institution of Structural Engineers". 20 February 2023.
  2. ^ "IStructE Gold Medal for AKT II co-founder Albert Williamson-Taylor". AKT II. 22 February 2023.
  3. ^ "Notable Alumni - Albert Williamson Taylor". University of Bradford.
  4. ^ Williamson-Taylor, Albert (21 September 2023). "Albert Williamson-Taylor: Gold Medal Address 2023". The Institution of Structural Engineers.
  5. ^ "Albert Williamson-Taylor". Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat. 2013.
  6. ^ "IStructE Gold Medal for AKT II co-founder Albert Williamson-Taylor". AKT II. 22 February 2023.
  7. ^ "London Design Festival - Partners". London Design Festival.
  8. ^ "Design and Engineering: Albert Williamson-Taylor". Architectural Association School of Architecture. 14 January 2021.
  9. ^ "Technical Master - Albert Williamson-Taylor". AADRL.
  10. ^ "Press Release: Open City appoints world-renowned engineer Albert Williamson-Taylor as president". Open City. 31 May 2022.
  11. ^ "Albert Williamson-Taylor". Syracuse Architecture. December 2023.
  12. ^ "About Open City". Open City. 2023.
  13. ^ "AFI | Board of Trustees: Albert Williamson-Taylor". African Futures Institute. 2023.
  14. ^ Taekwondo, North London (September 29, 2014). "Mr Albert Williamson-Taylor Era". North London Taekwondo (NLTKD).
  15. ^ Rashid, Naaz (5 September 2011). "Behind the Wood Green riots: 'a chance to stick two fingers up at the police'". The Guardian.
  16. ^ "About Us". Global Taekwondo International.
  17. ^ "North London Taekwondo Instructors". North London Taekwondo (NLTKD). 2005.
  18. ^ "History of ITF Instructor Courses". History of Taekwondo. 10 April 2015.
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