ARCH 3011 - Architectural Design Studio II

This course teaches students the principles of architectural design and the design process in a studio setting. Students will work through projects intended to introduce both a depth and breadth of knowledge relative to design fundamentals through hands-on application. In this course, process is valued as highly as produce because it is critical to students' development. This includes the ability to be self-critical, to cycle through multiple iterations of a design concept, to look to precedent and be able to adapt and adopt these into their own work. The objectives of this course are to help students develop basic skills of architectural composition and representation, the awareness of the role of program in architecture, and their awareness of the interaction between buildings and their context - building on concepts introduced in ARCH 3010. Technical skills that are further developed include plan, section and elevation; form generation and its relationship to space making; compositional techniques; intermediate material properties; basic programming skills; and intermediate model-making skills (both physical and computer-generated) and modes of representation(both digital and analog). Projects will include full-scale mockups of design proposals as well as explorations of theoretical proposals for actual sites across the country. Each spring, students in ARCH 3011 travel to visit a major metropolitan area in the US to explore architectural projects in context and to conduct site analysis that will be used in design proposals. The course has an emphasis on the interrelationships among design process, site historical precedent, structural elements, theoretical explorations, and technology of construction as design response to programmatic requirements.