Togzhan Aubakirova

Design Director

The decision to study architecture when she finished school at 17 led Togzhan not only to her future profession but to her life’s passion. After graduating from architecture school (Kazakh Leading Academy of Architecture and Civil Engineering) in her hometown of Almaty with a whirl of architectural ambitions and ideas, she continued her design education in Germany. There, she distilled her thoughts and refined her approach with more clarity, receiving a master’s degree in 2008

During her years living in Europe, Togzhan participated in many workshops and competitions that introduced her to different aspects of European culture, influences that she used to form an experimental architectural design group on her return to Kazakhstan. Alongside this, she taught at the Kazakh Architectural Academy, before joining the Almaty office of AEDAS in 2009.

Togzhan has engaged with projects of many different scales, in different cities and countries, and alongside many different collaborators. Throughout her career, however, she has remained true to one fundamental design principle: that the architectural design must be sufficiently coherent to inform and direct all future human interactions in that space, drawing from a deep understanding of the context and the potential scenarios that might take place there.