Douglas Pancoast

This course is a comprehensive introduction to two-dimensional architectural and interior architectural representation. Students learn hand-drawing and digital techniques to produce orthographic, axonometric, isometric, and perspectival projections in individual and group projects. Students move between two- and three-dimensional representation, developing robust skills for design drawing.

Typically the course will review the work of architects and designers throughout the history of architecture representation. Readings will vary and focus will be concentrated on understanding and putting into practice the mechanisms of drawing.

Course work consists of building techniques and practice of drawing. Classes will develop incremental skills through assignments and projects that culminate into complex drawings and representations. This course requires students to have a laptop that meets SAIC's minimum hardware specs and runs the AIADO template.

Descriptive Techniques will provide a foundational survey and sampling of architectural representational conventions, hardware and software systems for analysis, visualization, materialization and iteration as well as an introduction to material processes and tool systems for design materialization, prototyping and iteration. Special focus will be given to examining emerging computational tools and media and their implication on the design of material things and places.

Readings will vary but will typically include excerpts from process instruction manuals (contemporary and archival). A structural element of this class is that it will run with a combined cohort made of 2-year option and 3-year option student groups - mixing established students with arriving students. The large class will have 2 or more assigned faculty and will explore independent and collaborative modes of learning. This will contribute to the program¿s learning culture.

Course work will consist of a survey of a variety of hardware and software based serial production processes useful for the development and communication of architectural concepts (3 to 5 digital systems, 6 to 9 material processes). Assignment work will be 80% individual response to project prompts and 20% collaborative projects. Readings meant to situate processes in a developmental history will be offered as a critical aspect of material / process learning.

Student and program criteria that address the most recent National Architectural Accreditation Board (NAAB) requirements will be highlighted and form part of the coursework outcomes.

Resilient Systems will provide an introduction to a broad understanding of sustainability, including analysis of site, landscape and cultural context as a precondition to architectural conceptualization. Students will demonstrate ability to synthesize sustainable systems and approaches into design projects including green infrastructure, active and passive structural and mechanical systems, facility with material properties and performance, repairability + preservation design.

Readings will be compiled from sources focused on material systems and their cultural histories and case study from trade and professional journals.

This seminar course will include both 2-year and 3-year MArch students - mixing established students with arriving students. The large class will have 2 or more assigned faculty and will explore independent and collaborative modes of learning. This format will contribute to the program's learning culture.

Assignments will consist of a series of short, topical design projects where students synthesize knowledge of sustainable systems and approaches into propositional architectural drawings and models. One semester long project will be integrated and balanced with several short vignette projects.

Student and program criteria that address the most recent National Architectural Accreditation Board (NAAB) requirements will be highlighted and form part of the coursework outcomes.

This intermediate studio in the accredited professional graduate degree addresses the design of a building with a complex interior space program and includes a focus on building skins, systems, sustainability, accessibility, and life safety. Course goals and objectives include the full range of pre-design work, visual communication of concept and program diagramming, and the consideration of structural and other building systems, accessibility, sustainability, and site design. Students will also conduct research into client organizations and the design of effective environments.

Case studies, readings and research will be project specific and determined through the programs defined in the studio.

The studio work is cumulative and develops through milestones that culminate in a final portfolio and review for the course.

Student and program criteria that address the most recent National Architectural Accreditation Board (NAAB) requirements will be highlighted and form part of the coursework outcomes.

Thesis studio asks students to determine and research an original problem with pertinent issues, and design an innovative response to some aspect of architectural production. The work will be exhibited at the end of the semester in the annual Design Show.

Course goals and objectives include:
1) Develop the ability to discover, define, and research a significant aspect of architectural production in depth.
2) Develop an approach to an important issue of contemporary significance to the field of architecture and communicate it concisely.
3) Work with originality, clarity, and appropriate skill to design, fabricate, and install an exhibition.

Student and program criteria that address the most recent National Architectural Accreditation Board (NAAB) requirements will be highlighted and form part of the coursework outcomes.