Global Arc

A broad overview of the discipline of architecture: its history, theories, methodologies, and its manners of thinking and working. Rather than a chronological survey, the course will be organized thematically, with examples drawn from a range of historical periods as well as contemporary practice. Through lectures, readings, precepts, and studio sessions, students will acquire a working knowledge of key texts, buildings, and architectural concepts. Two lectures, one preceptorial.

The first in a series of design studios offered to students interested in majoring in architecture. The course will introduce architecture as an "impure'' plastic art, inseparable from a network of forces acting upon it. The student will be confronted with progressively complex exercises involving spatial relations in two dimensions, three dimensions, and time. The course will stress experimentation while providing an analytical and creative framework to develop an understanding of structure and materials as well as necessary skills in drawing and model making. Two three-hour studios with lectures included.

The course focuses on the social forces that shape design thinking. Its objective is to introduce architectural and urban design issues to build design and critical thinking skills from a multidisciplinary perspective. The studio is team-taught from faculty across disciplines to expose students to the multiple forces within which design operates.

This course sets out two goals: the first is to understand the theories and techniques of geometry in architectural representation; the second is to develop the student's drawing sensibilities through 5 thematic drawing projects engaging both digital and manual techniques. Each new theme will be introduced through a lecture, tutorial, and discussion including a number of specific readings related to the topic at hand. The second class will be an individual desk crit to discuss the development of each drawing project. The third class will consist of a group pin-up review of each drawing experiment.

South Asia is often imagined as a chaotic place where infrastructure is in a constant battle against the forces of nature. Monsoon rains erode roads, summer heat shuts down power grids, winter snow closes vehicular access, while dry riverbeds open new routes. On the contrary, infrastructure is also imagined as the only means by which the vagaries of nature and geography can be overcome. How then, can we understand these nebulous terms upon which a utopian imagination of the future is grounded?

Explores the relationships between architectural discourse and the visual arts from the historical avant-garde to the present. Architectural discourse will be considered here as the intersection of diverse systems of representation: buildings, projects, drawings, but also architectural theory and criticism, exhibitions, photographs, professional magazines, and the popular press. The course will treat as visual arts not only painting and sculpture, but also photography, cinema, fashion, advertisement, and television. Two lectures, one preceptorial.

This course examines two places that play an outsized role in the American economy: Wall Street and Silicon Valley. They are distinct and similarly enduring locations. They embody a divide between urban and suburban, East Coast and West Coast, skyscrapers and office parks, tradition and innovation, conservative and liberal. Despite the ubiquity of electronic trading, firms still congregate in Lower Manhattan. Tech workers fight traffic to maintain a presence in Mountain View. What makes these places endure? How do their histories, architecture, economic dynamics, and distinct cultures shape them as places?

Examination of a range of urban spatial types, city plans, maps, and communication networks. Focus on how inherited models have been used by modern architects/planners in the 20th century. One 90-minute lecture, one 90-minute preceptorial.

Studies of the contemporary problems and process of urban design and physical planning. Analysis of the design and organization of space, activities, movement, and interaction networks of the urban physical environment. One three-hour seminar.

This seminar will utilize and hone students¿ research, design, and graphic design skills in a study of the interrelationship between sustainability, urbanism, development, and design. We will produce an analysis and critique of current planning trends and create proposals for new methods of urban planning and design, working towards the development of new building typologies and planning standards that fuse the ecological and the architectural. We will focus on specific issues surrounding development in areas experiencing growth due to the phenomenon of eco-tourism.