After 37 years on the Drexel faculty and 25 years of leadership Paul M. Hirshorn, AIA has retired at the end of the academic year 2010-2011. Hirshorn was Head of the Department of Architecture from 1986 to 2007, Head of the Department of Architecture + Interiors from 2007 to 2010 and served as Architecture Program Director this past year. Under his leadership the Arfaa Lecture Series was established, the Architecture Program’s off-campus studies programs were launched and the unique 2+4 architecture degree program was created. Paul Hirshorn has worked tirelessly for the Department, the Program and for Drexel University and we would like to thank and acknowledge him for his many contributions.


Assistant Professor Dr. Ulrike Altenmüller-Lewis, AIA has assumed the position of Program Director for Architecture in July 2011. Dr. Altenmüller-Lewis had served as Associate Director of the Architecture Program since she began teaching at Drexel in September 2008. This past spring Professor Altenmüller-Lewis won the prestigious Allen Rothwarf Award for Teaching Excellence, Drexel’ University’s highest teaching award.

Erik Sundquist has joined the Department of Architecture + Interiors as an Assistant Teaching Professor in the Architecture Program. Prior to his appointment at Drexel University, Sundquist taught at the College of Architecture and the Arts at Florida International University in Miami Florida. As a practicing architectural designer he has collaborated with architects, artists, industrial designers and interior designers on high profile projects that span four continents. Eric Sundquist received his BA in Psychology and Economics from The University of Massachusetts, a MA in Political Psychology from SUNY Stony Brook and his MArch from Florida International University. In his teaching and research, he has explored the role of sustainability in professional practice and effects of digital based design on traditional notions of building tectonics and scale.

Nicole Koltick has been promoted to Assistant Professor in the Department of Architecture + Interiors. She coordinates the technology course work and digital initiatives in the Interiors Design undergraduate and Interior Architecture and Design graduate programs. Nicole Koltick received an M. Arch. from UCLA and a BFA, in Art with University Honors, from Carnegie Mellon University. She is a principal of the trans-dicsiplinary design firm lutz/koltick. Koltick’s current research interests include future speculation, robotics, computation, artificial intelligence and interactive environments. She is interested in exploring the boundaries between technology, science, the “natural,” the built environment and its inhabitants. Nicole Koltick works with complex and fantastical narratives as well as multi-agent systems and advanced computational strategies to envision new landscapes, environments and territories for inhabitation.