Common First Year

COA1011: Fundamentals of Design and the Built Environment I

Course Overview

The first of two design studios in the Common First Year sequence required of all students entering the College of Architecture undergraduate programs.  The studio sequence proceeds from a broad understanding of design as a particular set of operations that shape virtually everything in the world:  places, spaces, products, systems, and environments.

During the fall studio, investigations occur at the scale of the body, the object, and the 'building'.  Each investigation is structured through a suite of exercises that focus on specific materials, techniques, and media.  The exercises apprentice students in the strategic use of different media and techniques, as part of the apparatus, or tool-kit,  with which to engage the world around them.

Exercises 1 and 2 start off the semester with a series of fast-paced 'materials and media' calisthenics.  Students are introduced to charcoal, pencil, and collage; to line, tone, and texture; to various conventions of orthographic and axonometric projections; and to the basics of modeling and fabrication, among others. 

Exercise 3 introduces measured drawing, full-scale models, and collaborative design procedures.  Students diagram, measure and draw a series of objects in order to first understand and then design strategies for 'containers' for these objects.

In Exercise 4, the focus shifts to the observation, documentation, and analysis of building elements and spaces.  Students identify and study how phenomena, use, materials, and assemblies reshape our perception of buildings and spaces. 

Exercise 4 provides a scaffold for this open-ended yet rigorous inquiry by asking students to observe and describe through serial studies using charcoal, photography, composite drawings, construction drawings, and collage.

Students begin by working back from an existing condition, describing and re-describing it from multiple points of view.  A final charrette reverses the descriptive gaze, with students proposing 'variations' that build upon, rework, and extend the particular spatial, formal, material, and phenomenal qualities identified in the course of the investigation.

Each exercise ends with a written response to the learning afforded by the exercise.  These self-reflections reinforce both the individual experiences and the common apparatus through which the experiences unfold. 

Learning Objectives 

• Learning to observe; learning to describe.
• Facility in a wide range of media and technologies of representation.
• Problematize prior assumptions of what design is, and what it may encompass.
• Understand the iterative nature of design inquiry and the role different media and genres of representation play in design inquiry.
• Understand design as discursive activity that draws strength from discussion, critique, self-reflection, and collaboration.
• Introduce basic digital software to enable digital documentation of work after each exercise.

Course Requirements & Evaluation Criteria

• Intensity of effort; procedural clarity; quality of craft; regular work habits.
• Successful completion of all studio exercises, reflection responses and digital documentation.
• Attendance of all studio sessions, including pinups and juries. 
• No unexcused absences.