Design Strategies
ARCH 4803
John Peponis
The aim of the course is to provide an understanding of design as the synthetic imaginative production of an architectural proposal that satisfies multiple requirements while projecting an integrity of form, conception and purpose. The course begins by discussing the underlying logic and nature of design. The subsequent focus is upon the diverse strategies and approaches that animate design thinking, design practice and design inquiry. These are illuminated by a series of case studies and comparisons.

Healthcare Design of the Future
ARCH 4803/6271 ID 6271
Craig Zimring, David Cowan
This active multidisciplinary workshop provides an introduction to healthcare and healthcare design, focusing on how to identify and evaluate opportunities for innovation, how to set up and analyze field studies, how to conduct multidisciplinary human-centered design projects and how to express results in physical, written and graphic form, including mockups.

Bioconstructivisms: Tinkering vs Engineering
ARCH 4803/6352/8803

Lars Spuybroek

Structure is usually viewed as clearly defined elements linking up in a state of either tension or compression, where all form simply follows the laws of force. The structures of nature, however, exhibit far greater complexity than any humanly engineered system. Without exception natural structures are in constant temporal development; their parts fulfill many, often conflicting roles simultaneously; and there is enormous redundancy in such systems. When we look at how soap bubbles interact or how the brain grows, how birds build their nests, or how the skin can wrinkle; we always observe the same excessive variation in combination with a rigorous logic. “Nature is always tinkering,” said the evolutionary biologist François Jacob in the early 1970s. The concept of tinkering is based on a constant redefinition and variation of elements. Bioconstructivism is the art of tinkering: combining logic with vagueness. This elective discusses the main protagonists of such ideas.

Fees and Profits, Planning a Career in Architecture
ARCH 4803/8803

James P. Cramer

This dynamic course is focused on business and entrepreneurialism in the ever-changing and expanding profession of architecture. The lessons begin with learning strategic planning as a core competency designed to aid lifelong success in architecture practice. We will focus on new and relevant case studies about professionalism and making money in the profession of architecture. There are three sections included: 1. Architects compensation (how much money do architects make today and how?) 2. Professional practice fees (how much are architects charging for services and why?), and 3. Profits and other critical business metrics to support the delivery of design excellence. All sizes of firms will be studied. This will include the sharing of new metrics on the most successful small practices in America. New research from Cramer’s research: Small Firm Success, How the Smallest Architecture Firms are Thriving in an Age of Acceleration. In addition, there will be a focus on the successful mid-size practice and several case studies directly from the AIA’s Large Firm Roundtable (LFRT).

The Left Hand of Darkness: Shadows in Architecture: Stubbins Seminar
ARCH 4833/6352/8833

Mark Cottle

Plato's Allegory of the Cave describes a world where all we can perceive of reality are its shadows. Pliny the Elder tells us that painting began when a young Corinthian woman, desiring a memento of her lover, a sailor, who would be leaving in the morning, traced his shadow on the wall while he slept. Galileo Galilei trained his new telescope on the waxing and waning Moon, and, from his understanding of chiaroscuro, deduced that the Moon was not smooth, as had been thought, but covered in vast mountains and craters, whose dimensions he could calculate from their shifting shadows. In our everyday lives, shadows are integral to sight, as we construct and construe our visions of the world from the meagre information that reaches our retinae. In this seminar we will look at how artists and architects have used their deepening understanding of how light and shade operate to inform their work. We will look at some of the work, discuss a few select readings, and make a lot of drawings, in charcoal, ink, watercolor... The best of the materials we produce in the seminar will form the core of an upcoming exhibition in the Stubbins Gallery this spring.

Building Physics Modeling
ARCH 4833/6242
Tarek Rakha

Computers can be employed as design partners that aid architects, urban designers and planners in efficiently simulating their design challenges. Building physics modeling offers an opportunity to understand the science behind human perceptions of light and heat in the built environment using advanced simulation technologies. This course teaches thermal and luminous environmental design through architectural building physics modeling. The course first motivates the use of Building Performance Simulation (BPS), explores the basic scientific principles underlying energy flows in buildings, and uses precedent built environment design methodologies to explore performance modeling. Computational tools and analysis techniques for designing comfortable and energy efficient environments are introduced, and are used as a hands-on vehicle for enhancing building performance. The ultimate goal is for students to gain lifelong skills by learning state-of-the-art simulation tools developed in research to be used as a means for understanding, developing and improving environmental systems.

Concrete Workshop: Parametric Precast I
ARCH 4833/8833
Tristan Al-Haddad

Concrete Workshop : Parametric Precast I is a two semester research based workshop focused on developing next generation precast concrete wall systems. Working in groups, the students in the course will develop state-of-the-art variable precast wall systems and will work with Gate Precast to cast full scale prototypes to be installed in the School of Architecture. The workshop will focus on issues of Aesthetics (pattern and composition), Performance (thermal and structural), Process (from forming to erection), Material (cement based steel reinforced structures), and Economics (efficiencies of material and construction). The course will engage the Digital Fabrication Lab where students will be expected to push the limits of computational design and digital fabrication within the context of precast concrete design and construction.

Constructing and Thinking the Visual
ARCH 4803/8803
Harris Dimitropoulos

Visual Composition - Visual Semiotics - Color Theory (additive and subtractive color systems) - Seeing vs Looking - Visual Communication - Thinking Visually Critical Understanding of Images and Image Making - Visual Messages

Drawing on Nature
ARCH 4833/8833
Lane Duncan, Dr. Jeanette Yen, Dr. Marc Weissburg

This excerpt from Emerson’s essay, History, is a timeless reminder that the ability to visually represent conceptual thought is fundamental to any field of endeavor, whether from the point of external observation or internal diagrams and projections. It is the intention of this course to creatively explore the design principles inherent in the makeup of the natural world through the art of drawing. Since the beginning of recorded history, the theories and the techniques of drawing have been of primary importance to our understanding of that world. The ancient concept of linear circumscription or outline, tone, value and color has been the basis upon which we visually describe our perceptions and define our intentions.

Collage
ARCH 4833/8833
George B. Johnston

Collage has played a significant role in shaping both perceptual and intellectual spheres in the modern era. Concepts of simultaneity, superimposition, multiplicity, flatness, and phenomenal depth are materialized through techniques of cutting and pasting in a host of media. ARCHITECTURE has been affected by these practices in both formal and programmatic terms, in the development of concepts and strategies of assembly. And the temporal dimension of everyday life is mnemonically embedded in the layered joints of the collaged surface, itself a material history. THIS COURSE will familiarize students with the intellectual history of collage, will examine related practices within allied arts— architecture, literature, visual arts, film—and will engage a series of intensive exercises in collage making in which landscapes at multiple scales will be examined for the generative lessons they hold for seeing, thinking, and making.

Advanced Productions
ARCH 4833/8833

Keith Kaseman

Advanced integrations of digital design and production technologies such as Augmented Reality (AR) are currently defining the core of future trends in architecture and construction. ADVANCED PRODUCTIONS is a research seminar geared to teach architects and designers to effectively interweave technical exploration, design agility, collaborative ingenuity and strategic operations in preparation to become leaders in these developing trends. A key objective for ADVANCED PRODUCTIONS is to develop best practices in relation to both learning and utilizing advanced digital design and production techniques, tools and insights in preparation for work to be executed as a final project.

Design Portfolio Design
ARCH 4833/8833
Jude LeBlanc

of this portfolio workshop is to explore strategies of description, representation, and presentation (and other art-related ideas) in order to communicate design work and design speculation effectively. Deliverables will include a digital and hard copy version of a comprehensive portfolio. The course meets T and Th, 6:00-7:15, Room 356 West Arch. It is open to undergraduate and graduate students in Architecture or Industrial Design. The workshop is recommended for students nearing the end of their studies, or at least mid-way. If done properly, this will be time consuming.

REVIT
ARCH 4833/8833
Geoffrey Maulion

Visualizing a form enhances a designer’s ability to communicate ideas and the ability to analyze and evaluate these forms provides the ability to optimize its performance. Revit is not just a 3D modeling tool or a documentation tool. This course will demonstrate how Revit can facilitate the conception of a design from various points of genesis. This will then be contextualized in its applications in both the academic and the professional environment. Revit will be presented in relation to architectural concepts to understand why and how BIM can be used rather than just the functionality of the tool. Analytical, formal, and experimental processes will be integrated directly into the Revit learning tutorials. Case study “Show and Tells” will demonstrate real world applications of each subject in order to understand the reach of each exercise. Team projects will be assigned to understand the collaborative nature of Revit and BIM.

Digital Craft: A Design/Build Workshop
ARCH 4833/8833

Stuart Romm​

This design-build workshop is part of a larger framework of courses being developed in the College of Design’s interdisciplinary curriculum enabling students to dig deeper into the research and hands-on skills of digital craft. This bold initiative looks to the future of integrated BIM design and digital fabrication, advancing the industry trend toward increasingly collaborative design-build project delivery.

Theories of Urban Design
ARCH 6151/6352
Ellen Dunham-Jones

The course equips students with an understanding of the foundational ideas and strategies that we confront and debate in the practice of urban design and in the interface between buildings and cities. Bracketed by discussions of historical and contemporary theories and issues, the bulk of the course is organized around four perennial urban design themes. Each theme will be the focus for two weeks with lectures, assigned “classic” texts and class discussions. How do the different authors propose that territory should be organized? How do they treat public space vs private property? Program vs type? Site vs cultural context? Social vs formal concerns? In addition to the “classic” texts, other brief readings will support the primary text, criticize it, or bring it into the present.

Urban Design: Policy and Implementation
ARCH 6303/ CP 6834
Michael Dobbins

The course will explore the roles that citizens, professionals, developers, and public officials play in crafting urban design policy and what it takes to get good urban design done. We will focus particularly on the latter- the rules, the tools, the techniques, and the strategies that shape policy and account for our civic environment. The goal is to introduce pre professionals to the integration and synthesis of planning, design, and development in response to the physical and spatial needs and desires for the broad and diverse everyday public.

Design-Based Zoning Workshop
ARCH 8801
Christy Dodson, Elizabeth Ward, Ian Fralick

WHAT SHAPES OUR CITY? WHO HAS THE RIGHT TO SHAPE OUR CITY? HOW ARE WE – AS CITY DWELLERS AND DESIGNERS – MEANT TO SHAPE ITS FUTURE? THIS WORKSHOP WILL CHALLENGE STUDENTS TO THINK CRITICALLY ABOUT WHY OUR CITIES AND BUILDINGS LOOK THE WAY THEY DO AND HOW WE CAN PLAY AN ACTIVE ROLE IN SHAPING A BETTER FUTURE. OUR DISCUSSIONS WILL EXPLORE THE IMPACT OF ZONING CODES ON MOBILITY, AFFORDABILITY, EQUITY AND SUSTAINABILITY. THE WORKSHOP WILL CULMINATE IN A DEEPER UNDERSTANDING OF OUR EXISTING RULES AND FUTURE ROLES AS CITY-SHAPERS IN ENSURING THAT OUR BUILT PLACES AND URBAN ENVIRONMENTS PROMOTE DESIGN, BEAUTY, DIGNITY AND HUMAN EXPERIENCE.

Advanced Design Scripting
ARCH 6502
Dennis Shelden, Sinisa Kolaric

The course is based on developing theoretical knowledge and practical solutions by asking the following three questions: 1. How are building systems, requirements and processes represented in building models and databases? 2. How can data regarding systems, requirements and processes be linked? 3. How can we use scripting and coding tools to bridge these disparate data sets?

Inquiry in Building Performance
ARCH 6242
Tarek Rakha

This course introduces students to the methods and background for conducting advanced investigations in the field of high performance built environments. The goal is to establish the student’s contextual knowledge in environmental and architectural environmental performance through rigorous quantitative and qualitative frameworks, followed by a deep dive in a specific field of inquiry that establishes specialty knowledge. The outcome of such inquiry will be a comprehensive literature review research paper focusing on a topic of interest of the individual student’s choice within the realm of building performance research. The review paper will be developed throughout the coursework, using a series of directed assignments that gives the students a chance to be at the heart of knowledge as it unfolds through scholarship. Research concerns will be used as a means to enrich the process of learning, and put students at the forefront of discovery.

Shape Grammars
ARCH 6508
Thanos Economou

A course on the formal (visual / mathematical) analysis and composition in design. Students explore fundamentals of spatial and visual composition through the Shape Machine, a new software/plug-in for Rhino developed at the Shape Computation Lab at the School of Architecture. The class and the tutorials are based on the shape grammar formalism, one of the most powerful formal systems for the generative description of designs. Significantly, the software implementation of visual computations rather than symbolic (scripting) computations promises an entirely new approach for the automation of visual recognition and doing in design, strongly suggesting new links between art, design, mathematics, psychology, neuroscience and more, not previously explored

Design Programming I
ARCH 8833
Dennis Shelden

Design Programming I offers a comprehensive introduction to computer programming focused on graphics, 3D and CAD / BIM applications. The course provides an accelerated introduction to prevalent programming languages and constructs, graphics libraries and development environments. Students will be exposed to two main programming paradigms using a set of common programming language conventions:

Construction Materials, Systems, and Fabrications
ARCH 8803
Jake Thompkins

Construction Materials, Systems, and Fabrications Provides an introduction to both traditional and digital fabrication in commonly encountered architectural and industrial materials. The courses primary goal is to tie knowledge of material properties to manufacturing techniques and subsequently to an understanding of conventional and automated fabrication machines. This course is open to M. Arch and M.I.D. students. The course is open to undergraduate students on a space-available basis.
Mechatronics Lab
ARCH 8851
Mehmet Sinan Bermek, Russell Gentry

The lab is intended as an introduction to programming microcomputers to read sensors and control actuators – with an emphasis on the development of machines and software to sense and control the built environment and interface with fabrication machines and robots. The lab will focus on the Arduino platform but will also include a brief introduction to the Raspberry PI. Students in the course will complete six lab assignments focused the control of lights, motors and actuators, and the reading of environmental sensors, cameras, etc. At the end of week five, each student will submit a final project proposal which will be completed over the last half of the semester. No lectures will be presented during the last half of the semester. Rather, this time will be used for independent work on final projects, student presentation of intermediate project plans and results, and tutoring by the lecturers. The course grade will be given based on the completion of the homework assignments (50%) and the completion, documentation and presentation of the final project (50%).

Drone Technology Applications in the Built Environment
BC 4803/8803
Dr. Javier Irizarry

The course takes a practical and hands-on approach to the introduction of drone technology applications. By course completion, students will be able to describe the various drone related technologies introduced, and will be able to functionally apply many of them. Students will also be able to develop strategies for the integration of several of the covered drone technologies into built environment operational workflows including construction and facility management.

Water Resource Planning - Pollution, Scarcity, and Sustainability
CP 6241

Sally Bethea

We will introduce students to the geometry of space and manifolds and how these concepts influenced modern arts and sciences, i.e. Cubism and Einstein’s relativity. The realization of geometry is visualization. Students will learn how to draw/sketch by hand in order to stimulate/enhance their visual memory, imagination and practice abstraction of geometric concepts. Fluidity in drawing implies fluidity in thinking. The course will be integrated with weekly lab sessions taught by an Atlanta-based professional artist, who will teach students drawing concepts and students will have to practice sketching, and both figure and geometric drawing with a special focus on both exact representation (Renaissance art) and geometric abstraction (cubism, modern Art). Students’ artwork will be exhibited in a local art gallery.

Special Topics: Visual Arts and Geometry
CEE 8824
Francesco Fedele

We will introduce students to the geometry of space and manifolds and how these concepts influenced modern arts and sciences, i.e. Cubism and Einstein’s relativity. The realization of geometry is visualization. Students will learn how to draw/sketch by hand in order to stimulate/enhance their visual memory, imagination and practice abstraction of geometric concepts. Fluidity in drawing implies fluidity in thinking.

Origami Engineering
CEE 4803 

Glaucio Paulino 

This class acquaints the student with state-of-the-art algorithms to design and analyze origami structures. Students will learn how to create and transform geometries by folding and unfolding, and thus apply origami to solve engineering and societal problems. In addition, using origami as a tool, we will outreach to some fundamental concepts in differential geometry.