MORPHOLOGY

We shape our buildings: thereafter they shape us.

- ​Sir Winston Churchill

Coursework this semester will focus on the evaluation, development, and synthesis of architectural form.  We will explore the ideas, techniques, and challenges related to creating form in architecture.  We will then use this information in a series of projects that focus on the creation of a design solution based on a particular formal strategy.  Elements of form such as the wall, the grid, and the cube will be applied to solve specific design problems that address issues in the world around us on both a local and global scale.

F L U X from candas sisman on Vimeo.

Proposed Projects

Architecturally Significant Houses: Dwelling Across Time

Architecture should speak of its time and place, but yearn for timelessness.

 - Architect Frank Gehry

For this project, students will be developing a set of architectural drawings and construction documents for a historically significant house.  Students will research and analyze the work of the house’s architect as well as the design characteristics of the house itself.  With this understanding, they will create a comprehensive set of drawings from which the house could be built.  This process will require in-depth research, detailed inquiry, and the development of reasonable interpretations.

For students exploring architecture, this project will provide an overview of many different aspects of the profession.  We will have the opportunity to explore history, design theory and technique, as well as the various technologies and materials that make architecture possible.

Houses used for this exercise will come from a preselected list of homes that:

• are significant in the history of architecture
• reflect the thinking, beliefs, and technologies of their time
• were created by architects who have made or continue to make significant contributions to our built environment

The Camping Hut: Dwelling in the Wilderness

Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life.

– John Muir

This project is based on the design of micro-architecture that functions at the XS (eXtra Small) scale. Students will be creating a permanent camping structure for a remote site.  This dwelling will exist as a hybrid structure of house and tent.  Designs will provide a sense of permanent shelter while maintaining a raw, direct, physical and emotional connection to the landscape.  Students will be designing as their own client, so the building should reflect their interests, habits, body-type, and other individual characteristics.

The site for this project is remote – a wilderness area accessible only by foot, horseback, mountain bike, or other non-motorized means.  Because the site is remote, there are no utilities available.  The design of the structure and the utilization of environmental characteristics will be the means by which students are able to live comfortably with the land.

Eye of the Beholder from The Upthink Lab on Vimeo.

Millennial Live/Work Space: Housing a New Generation

…The Millennial Generation will entirely recast the image of youth from downbeat and alienated to upbeat and engaged – with potentially seismic consequences for America

– Neil Howe and William Strauss from Millennials Rising

For this project, students will be designing a mixed use building in an “infill” condition.  The building will house two separate functions, a public commercial space and a private residence.  The clients for this project will be a typical individual or group from the Millennial Generation (Generation Y, Generation Next, etc.).  Student designs will be required to respond to the needs, desires, and trends of this social group.  As a new development within the existing fabric of the city, they will also be charged with creating a contextual urban architecture.

Nine Square Grid House: The Machine in the Garden

A house is a machine for living in.

 – Architect Le Corbusier from Vers une Architecture

This project will explore the detached urban home developed through the lens of International Style Modernism and its architectural heritage.  The technical foundation for design of this house will be based on the nine square grid and Le Corbusier’s “Five Points of a New Architecture”. The clients for this project will be based on a unique urban family living in Dallas, Texas.  Student designs will have to respond to the needs, desires, and quirks that they develop in their clients.  As an additional challenge to this project, students will also be charged with creating a sustainable urban architecture for the traditional American detached house using the Living Building Challenge as a guide.

Prairie Visitor Center and Ecological Health Field Institute

The prairie, in all its expressions, is a massive, subtle place, with a long history of contradiction and misunderstanding.  But it is worth the effort at comprehension.  It is, after all, at the center of our national identity.

 - Wayne Fields, Lost Horizon

In this project, students will be designing a visitor center and facility to house the operations of a local nature preserve.  Located in a rare and unique environment, their design will focus on two individual issues:

• A basic element of architectural form as a starting point of design – the cube
• The relationships between building, landscape, and ecology

Students will be required to create and locate a building and functional program that will integrate with and/or stand out from the surrounding landscape.  This facility should contain all of the necessary elements for a working visitor center, educational facility, and research institute.  For this project, architecture students will be collaborating with the Career Center East graphic design department.  All students will be working under the guiding documents created by the Fort Worth Prairie Park and Great Plains Restoration Council.  Their goal will be to understand and fulfill the stated public mission of the organizations by providing designs that advocate for the preservation of this fragile and endangered landscape.

We are privileged to be working with the Fort Worth Prairie Park and representative JoAnn Collins as our client on this project.  We look forward to collaborating with her this school year to promote the vision of her organization and raise awareness about their efforts.