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James
McBennett

Background music: Lucky Chops playing Funky Town (1980) in the NYC subway with brass instruments.

I currently live in Denton, TX ๐ŸŽ๐Ÿค ๐ŸŽ“. I have previously lived in Baltimore๐Ÿ”ต๐Ÿฆ€, New York City๐Ÿฅฏ๐Ÿ•, Nashville๐Ÿ”ฅ๐Ÿ—, Dublin๐Ÿ‡ฎ๐Ÿ‡ชโ˜˜๏ธ๐Ÿบ, London๐ŸŽก๐Ÿ’‚, Copenhagen๐Ÿ‡ฉ๐Ÿ‡ฐ๐Ÿšด, Rotterdam๐Ÿ‡ณ๐Ÿ‡ฑ๐Ÿšด๐Ÿปโ€โ™€๏ธ, and Riyadh๐Ÿ”†๐Ÿซ.


In college, I studied architecture ๐Ÿ›–๐Ÿ ๐Ÿฉ๐Ÿฏ๐Ÿฐ๐Ÿซ๐Ÿ ๐Ÿ›– defined as the “physical manifestation of a society’s aspirations” by Professor Rahul Mehrotra. My interests include multi-modal cities ๐Ÿข๐Ÿšถ๐Ÿšด๐Ÿš‰๐ŸšŒ๐Ÿš•๐Ÿš—, automation, optimization, and performance ๐Ÿ–ฅ๏ธโฌ๐Ÿ”‹, digital fabrication and CNC๐Ÿช“๐Ÿค–๐Ÿช‘, complex geometry๐Ÿค“๐Ÿ“, extreme environments๐Ÿฅถ๐Ÿฅต, and iterative prototyping ๐Ÿ”๐Ÿฅผ. After my undergrad, I spent some time in the design firms of KPF, JDS and OMA. I’ve created online classes for HackadayU on introduction to computational geometry ๐Ÿ“ฆ๐Ÿซ– and advanced computational geometry ๐Ÿ–ฅ๏ธ๐Ÿง ๐Ÿ“.


I recently completed a Masters ๐ŸŽ“ in Advanced Computation ๐Ÿงฎ๐Ÿ’ป๐Ÿ”ข for Architecture and Design from the Institute of Advanced Architecture Catalonia in Barcelona ๐Ÿฅ˜๐Ÿ‡ช๐Ÿ‡ธ. (2022-23). This was my thesis on graph machine learning, rhino.compute and three.js.

.gif from IAAC MaCAD 2022/23 project ‘Mine(Us) Plus’ with Ren and Raghad explaining our process of spider-like hexapod robots that would arrive on Mars years before human settlement carving out material below the Martian ground surface followed by immediately 3D printing that material above ground to create a metaball geometry for accommodation on Mars.

Work (recent) ๐Ÿ’ฝ

Work (old) ๐Ÿ“ผ


I love to learn new things through short online courses that range from “the influence of superheroes ๐Ÿฆธ๐Ÿปโ€โ™€๏ธ๐Ÿฅท๐Ÿฆธ๐Ÿฝโ€โ™‚๏ธ๐Ÿฆธโ€โ™‚๐Ÿฆนโ€โ™€๏ธ on pop culture” to “cooking using physics ๐Ÿณ๐Ÿ”ฅ”. My favorite audiobooks ๐ŸŽง๐Ÿ“˜ to listen to are about behavioral economics ๐Ÿคช๐Ÿ“ˆ. My latest sourdough starter ๐Ÿž is called Scrappy.


I am married to Carey ๐Ÿ‘ธ๐Ÿผ. We record youtube ๐Ÿ“ฝ๏ธ videos when we travel ๐Ÿ›ต. I try to run ๐ŸŽฝ or swim ๐ŸŠ๐Ÿปโ€โ™‚๏ธ daily several times a week.


๐Ÿ“ธ๐Ÿˆ Instagram @jamesmcbennett
๐Ÿคช๐Ÿ’ฌ Twitter @mcbennett
๐Ÿ“„๐Ÿ“Š LinkedIn @mcbennett
๐Ÿ‘‰๐Ÿง  Creative Mornings @mcbennett


My favorite TED Talks ๐Ÿ’ก๐Ÿ’ฌ

There was once a time when I had watched every TED talk on the internet. The first TED talk that I listened to was Joshua Prince-Ramus presenting the work of OMA. TED massively expanded their library with TEDx in 2009. I launched TEDxGoodenoughCollege’s first ever event in 2011 and later helped TEDxDublin and TEDxLondon run some large events for 1000+ attendees. I was one of the first ever finalists for TED’s open call to speak on their main stage alongside Reggie Watts (who won), Joe Sabia, Cesar Kuriyama, and Joshua Walters who all shared their unique and deeply fascinating stories that night.

Favorites From TED

Cities, Architecture, and Infrastructure

Technology

Craig Venter
Craig Venter
See talks
Kevin Kelly
Kevin Kelly
See talks (3)
Nicholas Negroponte
Nicholas Negroponte
One Laptop Per Child
Ray Kurzweil
Ray Kurzweil
See talks (2)
Jeff Han
Jeff Han
Demos his breakthrough touchscreen
Saul Griffith
Saul Griffith
See talks (2)
Juan Enriquez
Juan Enriquez
See talks (3)
Neil Gershenfeld
Neil Gershenfeld
On Fab Labs
Christopher
Christopher โ€œmootโ€ Poole
The case for anonymity online
Blaise Aguera y Arcas
Blaise Aguera y Arcas
See talks (2)
Anand Agarawala
Anand Agarawala
Demos Bump Top
William Kamkwamba
William Kamkwamba
See talks (2)
Hod Lipson
Hod Lipson
Builds โ€œself-awareโ€ robots
Tim Berners-Lee
Tim Berners-Lee
See talks (2)
Ed Ulbrich
Ed Ulbrich
How Benjamin Button got his face
Shai Agassi
Shai Agassi
Bold plan for electric cars
Sergey Brin and Larry Page
Sergey Brin and Larry Page
On Google
Pattie Maes
Pattie Maes
Demo SixthSense
Deb Roy
Deb Roy
The birth of a word
Dean Kamen
Dean Kamen
See talks (3)
Johnny Lee
Johnny Lee
Demos Wii Remote hacks
Zach Kaplan
Zach Kaplan
Demo toys from the future
Philip Rosedale
Philip Rosedale
On Second Life
David Merrill
David Merrill
Demos Siftables
Pranav Mistry
Pranav Mistry
See talks (2)

Art & Design

Education

Food

Ideas

Business, Social Business & Marketing

Media and Entertainment

Explorers

Wade Davis
Wade Davis
See talks (2)
Lewis Pugh
Lewis Pugh
See talks (2)

School of Life ๐Ÿงฌ videos on philosophy

Greek & Roman Philosophers

History

Modern Philosophy

Asian Philosophy

Political Thought

Writers

Artists

Design files ๐Ÿ’พ for my 2013 Kickstarter: This Stool Rocks

Imperial .3dm .dxf .ai .pdf

Metric .3dm .dxf .ai .pdf