Werner Sobek presented a keynote address and co-presented the workshop “Reduce CO2 – With technology to zero emissions” at the 3rd Holcim Forum 2010. He participated in the Concluding Debate at the 4th Holcim Forum 2013 on “Economy of Sustainable Construction” and presented “We have to be more radical” at the inaugural Holcim Roundtable 2014. He was a workshop moderator for “Changing paradigms: Materials for a world not yet built” at the 6th Holcim Forum 2019 held in Cairo, Egypt.

For more than three decades, Werner Sobek researched and taught at various universities around the world about how we can make our built environment more sustainable and at the same time breathtakingly beautiful. He marked his retirement from active work at the University of Stuttgart with the farewell lecture “The Boundary Conditions of the Future” in May 2023. He considered the possibilities architects, engineers and designers already have today to cope with the challenges ahead of us such as climate change, dwindling resources and demographic change – and what still needs to change?

The Institute for Lightweight Structures & Conceptual Design (ILEK) specializes on research into new materials and concepts for lightweight and adaptive structures. The Werner Sobek Group engages in innovative engineering combined with the design of constructional elements and sophisticated concepts for sustainable buildings.

Werner Sobek studied architecture and structural engineering at the University of Stuttgart. As successor to architect Frei Otto and engineer Jörg Schlaich, Werner Sobek advocates a unique approach of bringing architects and engineers together, both during their training and in their professional activities. He is the former president of the Board of the German Sustainable Building Council (DGNB, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Nachhaltiges Bauen).