Online Resource Guide for Students

The primary goal of the School is to generate and sustain an environment of creative inspiration and informed understanding in the design of architectural works, for the benefit of students, faculty, the profession, and the community at large.

The School fully acknowledges its responsibility to address the special conditions of the urban environment through intellectual engagement, research, and experimentation, and supports creative interaction with the architectural profession and the urban community.

The School fosters the specialized educational needs of students wishing to pursue a professional career in architecture while maintaining an educational experience for all students that promotes an awareness and understanding of architectural issues and priorities." [Adopted and endorsed by the University in April 1997]

The School is committed to the creation of compelling architecture by promoting the art of making, by maintaining a reflective and critical attitude towards cultural context, and by fostering a collaborative environment for speculation and experimentation. Three primary fields of interest dominate:

• Material Imagination and the Poetics of Making: Design through fabrication, in which the communicative capacities of materials are explored through questions of poetic expression, crafting, media manipulation, and tectonic assembly. 

• The City and the Urban Situation: Exploration of cultural context through engagement with topical urban issues, professional and community resources and organizations, and critical questioning of contemporary theories and practices.

• Cultural Identity and Community Engagement: Creative collaboration with community partners fostered by dialogue and collective participation with local and remote organizations, institutions and groups, including the professional architectural community.