about
bio
Andrew Lymn-Penning is a lecturer in architecture at the University of South Australia (Teaching Academic, Level A) and a PhD candidate researching immersive learning environments, game-engine pedagogy, and AI-supported design workflows in architectural education. He holds an MArch and BArchSt from the University of South Australia.
He has coordinated and taught extensively across all three years of the Bachelor of Architectural Design — authoring core studios including Dwelling Studio, Communication Studio, and Advanced Design Media — and leads the school's first-year transition program. His research is embedded directly in his teaching, most visibly through SiteSeer, a virtual construction-learning platform developed to improve equity of access and construction literacy for architecture students regardless of site access or background.
He is a founding co-director of Adelaide Design Week and has represented the University of South Australia at academic and industry events across Australia and internationally.
research
PhD candidate, University of South Australia, 2022–present. Supervised by Ass. Prof. Damian Madigan.
- immersive construction learning and virtual site pedagogy
- game-engine based studio environments (SiteSeer)
- ergodic and procedural environments in architecture education
- AI-supported design workflows and generative AI literacy
- digital pedagogy and assessment design at scale
Research is inseparable from teaching practice — SiteSeer, AI literacy frameworks, and digital workflows are embedded as active educational innovations within the undergraduate program. SiteSeer has been selected for the Innovation Collaboration Centre Research Commercialisation Program and is the subject of an AEA Ignite Grant application (2026) for scaling across TAFE and university contexts.
publications
talks & panels
research funding
selected awards
currently exploring
The question of what happens to architectural education when generative AI becomes a native part of the design process — not as a novelty, but as a tool students are expected to navigate critically and competently from day one.
How game engines and ergodic environments might offer something that traditional site visits, drawings, and photographs cannot: the experience of being inside a space before it exists, or inside a building that can no longer be visited.
What a genuinely digital-native architecture curriculum looks like — one that doesn't retrofit digital tools into analogue structures, but rethinks the sequence of skills, the nature of evidence, and what it means to be ready for practice.