Michael Dunn is a student in the Master of Urban and Environmental Planning program in the School of Architecture. He possesses and extensive design background that ranges from the small scale of material design, to the large scales found in urban design. Michael graduated from Villanova University in 1995 with a degree in Mechanical Engineering and a concentration in Material Science. He was part of team of students that designed and built a two-wheel drive bicycle for their 4th year design project. This team was granted a series of domestic and international patents for the design.
After graduating, Michael worked as a design engineer at Materials Research and Design, Inc. in Rosemont, PA. During his stay he designed various types of fiber and matrix composite materials using Finite Element Analysis (FEA) software to improve a diverse range of products including satellites, military and civilian aircraft, and baseball bats. Following MR&D, Michael worked as an applications engineer for the FEA software company, where he specialized in consumer product design, technical support, and sales support.
A year later, Michael joined Christini Technologies, Inc. in 1998 as a co-owner and Vice-President of Research and Design. This company was founded specifically to develop and commercialize the two-wheel bicycle design that Mike worked on at Villanova. Michael enjoyed seeing a school project becoming successful in the larger world, and gained valuable experience designing and manufacturing consumer products. The company’s “Venture” AWD mountain bike design is now entering its third manufacturing run and continues to win rave reviews from avid mountain bikers. View this revolutionary bicycle at www.christini.com.
While at UVA Michael is studying how different processes of design and planning influence our lives and build urban spaces. He hopes to graduate and take part in the revitalization of urban Philadelphia. In that vein, he is presently an intern at GreenBlue in Charlottesville, a non-profit company created to provide the theoretical, technical, and information tools required to transform industry into an economically profitable, ecologically regenerative, and socially empowering activity through intelligent design.
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Office hours:
Email:
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Wed 11:30-1:30 pm, Campbell Hall 4th Floor Studio
(desk near the back)
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