Tom Dyckhoff — Biography

“I was, I realise with hindsight, a slightly odd teenager. Definitely a geek, but an odd geek at that. Geeks are at least meant to obsess, collectively, over computers or comic books, but, alone among my friends, I obsessed over buildings, bollards and town planning. And while eighteen-year-olds in more fashionable parts were discovering MDMA and acid house, I was high on Zaha Hadid. I got my thrills from the Architectural Review.”

(From The Age of Spectacle: the rise and fall of iconic architecture.)

Tom Dyckhoff is a historian, writer and broadcaster about architecture, geographies, design and cities.

He is the author of The Age of Spectacle: the rise and fall of iconic architecture (2017, Windmill Books), and the official guide to the architecture of 2012’s Olympic Games, The Architecture of London 2012: Vision, Design, Legacy (John Wiley & Sons).

Tom has written and presented lots of series and documentaries for television, including: Channel 4’s new design-and-making competition Handmade, four seasons of Netflix/BBC’s The Great Interior Design Challenge, Channel 4’s The Secret Life of Buildings and BBC’s The Culture Show and Saving Britain’s Past. He’s also written and presented many radio documentaries, podcasts and series, including BBC Radio 4’s The Design Dimension.

He teaches history and theory of cities & architecture to undergraduates and postgraduates at University College London and Central St Martins, University of the Arts, London.

Tom studied geography (MA) at Christ Church, Oxford University, and architectural history (MSc) at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London.

He was for a decade architecture and design critic for The Times, and, before that, deputy homes and design editor at The Guardian. He has written a weekly column for The Guardian newspaper’s Weekend magazine for almost 20 years, and has long written for a wide range of major international publications and websites including Esquire, GQ, Wallpaper, New Statesman, Domus, Icon and Blueprint. He’s also been head of exhibitions at the Royal Institute of British Architects, associate editor of Design magazine, and assistant editor of Perspectives on Architecture magazine.

Tom is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and has been an honorary senior research associate at the Bartlett Faculty of the Built Environment, University College London; a trustee on the board of the Architecture Foundation, the Arts Council’s architecture committee and the Twentieth Century Society committee. He has sat on the juries for many prestigious architecture and design prizes and competitions, such as, from 2008-2011, the national shortlisting jury for the Stirling Prize for architecture, the selection jury for the 2006 British Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale, and in 2013 the Stirling Prize finalists.

He also gives lectures, and talks at or hosts events for all sorts of people, companies, organisations and venues, from schoolchildren or business executives to audiences at the Hay Festival, the Victoria & Albert Museum to Il Salone del Mobile, Milan. Please check the News, events & appearances section on the homepage for the latest up-and-coming dates.

Tom also works regularly with commercial clients, such as British Airways, Heineken and Velux, creating content or advising on architecture, design and urbanism.

He lives in London, with his family.