Virginie Colaiuta is a Visiting Fellow at The Dickson Poon School of Law, and a member of the Centre for Construction Law at King's College London.

Virginie is also a partner of the London office of the law firm LMS Legal LLP. She acts as counsel, advocate and arbitrator in international arbitration proceedings deriving from construction and energy projects, also based on bilateral or multilateral investment treaties.

Virginie is admitted to practise as a Solicitor in England & Wales, as an Attorney at Law in New York, USA and as Avocat à la Cour in France. She also practised in Italy for a few years and has obtained a law degree in Italy from the University of Rome La Sapienza.

After having worked for a few years as the Chair of the Editorial Board of the law review “Construction Law International” published by the International Bar Association (“IBA”), Virginie has been acting since January 2022 as Vice Co-Chair of the International Construction Projects Committee of the IBA. She is also presently a member of the Executive Board of the Italian Society of Construction.

Research interests

Virginie is completing a doctoral thesis on “Procedural public policy in international arbitration” at the Université Panthéon-Assas Paris II

Virginie is also focusing on comparative construction law and lectures on “Defects and Liability under French law” for the Master of Business Engineering of the University of Stuttgart in Germany.

Teaching

Investment treaty protections
Conflicts of laws

Selected publications

The Similarity of Aims in the American and French Legal Systems with Respect to Arbitrators’ Powers to Determine Their Jurisdiction”, 18th ICCA Congress “International Arbitration 2006: Back to Basics?”, 13 ICCA Congress Series 154, 2006, p. 154.
“Acceleration of works and penalties for delay in France in construction projects”, 2010 International Construction Law Review, P. 27
“When does a violation of the domestic law of the host state amount to a violation of a public international law principle in determining protection of investors’claims?” in Energy Dispute Resolution: Investment Protection, Transit and the Energy Charter Treaty, Graham Coop (Editor), Juris Publishing, Inc., 2011, p. 3.
Differences between civil law and common law jurisdictions in the construction sector, in Donald Charrett (Editor) “Global challenges, shared solutions”, Sydney NSW Society of Construction Law (Australia), 2013.
“Construction contracts as ‘investments’ for the purposes of investment treaty arbitrations”, Van het Gebaande Pad, the Liber Amicorum in honour of Arent van Wassenaer, Instituut voor Bouzrecht, 2016.
"The protection of legitimate expectations relating to investments in infrastructure projects," in Liber Amicorum en l’honneur de William Laurence Craig (LexisNexis, 2016), p. 57.
“Recent reform of the French Civil Code”, Construction Law International, Vol. 12, Issue 1, March 2017, p. 35.
“The effect of Brexit on the construction industry”, Civil Engineering Surveyor, October 2017, p. 44.
“How construction and engineering companies may rely on international treaties to recover damages incurred when conducting business abroad”, Civil Engineering Surveyor, November 2017.
“Construction contracts as ‘investments’ for the purposes of investment treaty arbitrations” (with W. L. Craig), in Transnational Construction Arbitration”, Renato Nazzini (Editor), Taylor & Francis, 2017, p.98.
“Expropriation of contractual rights in investment treaty arbitration”, in Transnational Construction Arbitration” (with Marco Bollini), Renato Nazzini (Editor), Taylor & Francis, 2017, p.111.
Risk relating to ground conditions under French and English law, Construction Law International, Vol. 16, Issue 1, March 2021, p. 28.

Sue Hart

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