As part of a multi-year research initiative launched by the Canadian Centre for Architecture to investigate the development and application of digital tools in architecture, the publication series revisits twenty seminal projects designed between 1990 and 2000 that experimented with the use of these novel technologies, and documents the discussions and findings of the research program. The series recounts the development and application of digital technologies through the projects of European and North-American architects such as Lars Spuybroek, Karl Chu, Mark Goulthorpe, Asymptote, Bernard Cache, Peter Testa, Reiser/Umemoto, and Foreign Office Architects—each of whom is the object of an electronic monograph conceived for mobile devices. An accompanying print publication widens the topic of the origins of the digital in architecture beyond the narrative of the Archaeology of the Digital program, to address different perspectives on when and how architecture engaged with digital tools.

Greg Lynn is an architect based in Venice, California. He trained in architecture and philosophy and holds a graduate degree in architecture from Princeton University. The buildings, projects, publications, teachings, and writings associated with his studio, Greg Lynn FORM, have been influential in forwarding the use of advanced materials and technologies for design and fabrication. Lynn has collaborated with such companies as BMW, Boeing, Disney, and Imaginary Forces, and his work is in the permanent collections of design and architecture museums including the CCA, SFMoMA, the MCA Chicago, and MoMA. He was named one of the Top 100 Most Innovative People in the Twenty-First Century by Time magazine in 2001, received the American Academy of Arts and Letters Architecture Award in 2003, was listed among the ten most influential living architects by Forbes magazine in 2005, and won the Golden Lion at the Eleventh International Venice Biennale of Architecture in 2008.

Founded by Tamara Maletic and Dan Michaelson in 2005, Linked by Air specializes in the production of public spaces and other networked structures, both online and in the world. Through in-house programming, a practical and hands-on approach, and an emphasis on collaboration and iteration, Linked by Air approaches the design and technology of the digital publication series as intertwined inventive processes. The studio has received a Charles Nypels grant for research on embedded digital sign systems; has been in residence at the Jan Van Eyck Academie, Maastricht; and has won the Jury Prize at the Brno Graphic Design Biennial (2012).

Albert Ferré is associate director of publications at the CCA. Since 1989, he has explored the role of publishing as a form of cultural and architectural practice through editorial positions at the Catalan Association of Architects, the Prince Claus Fund, and Actar, where he directed the architecture program and edited numerous publications, including the Verb Boogazine series. He has complemented this editorial practice with curatorial activity focusing primarily in the dissemination of contemporary Catalan architecture. He studied architecture at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in Barcelona and was a visiting student at the Städelschule Frankfurt.

Andrew Goodhouse is an editor at the Canadian Centre for Architecture. Before editing When is the Digital in Architecture? he worked on AP164: Ábalos&Herreros selected by Kersten Geers and David Van Severen, Juan José Castellón González, Florian Idenburg and Jing Liu, with an interpretation in photographs by Stefano Graziani. He is a graduate of the master of arts program at the Bard Graduate Center: Decorative Arts, Design History, Material Culture.

Founded in 1979, the Canadian Centre for Architecture is an international research center and museum founded on the conviction that architecture is a public concern. Since its inception, it has increased public awareness of the role of architecture in society and promoted scholarly research. Through its exhibitions, research, collection, public programs, and website, the CCA has become a leading voice in promoting public understanding, widening thought and debate on architecture, its history, theory, and practice.