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Winners Announced for the 2020 Course Development Prize

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2020 COURSE DEVELOPMENT PRIZE IN ARCHITECTURE, CLIMATE CHANGE, AND SOCIETY

Architectural Faculty to Lead New Courses on Climate and Society

 

View the Winners

 

For Immediate Release:

New York City, February 20, 2020 – Columbia University’s Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture and the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) announce the winners of the 2020 Course Development Prize in Architecture, Climate Change, and Society. These innovative courses will be taught at a wide variety of architecture schools in the coming years.

The urgency of climate change seems to demand a singular focus that is antithetical to a humanities-based critical inquiry or longer-term creative and technical endeavors. These courses seek the kind of realism that redefines problems and leaves room for the imagination. They include methods and themes that innovate within their institutional settings—asking hard questions of students equal to the hard questions being asked of society as we grapple with the causes and effects of climate change.

Five courses were selected by the jury and each course winner will receive a $10,000 prize and support to lead their course at their host institution within the next two years. The five winning course proposals will be presented at the ACSA 108th Annual Meeting in San Diego, CA March 12-14, 2020.

The winners are: 

Adaptation to Sea Level Rise
Mason Andrews, Hampton University

A two-semester, cross-disciplinary course focusing on adapting to the impacts of sea-level rise in existing urban neighborhoods in sadly soggy southeastern Virginia has been in place since 2014. In the first semester, students of architecture, engineering, and, intermittently, of pure and social sciences, hear lectures from subject matter experts on soils and hydrology, preservation, urban design, public policy, social justice and more. Simultaneously, community engagement with stakeholders begins, as does a series of design initiatives in which the architecture students and faculty model the processes of Studio Based Learning. The latter is the subject of a current NSF program study by ethnographers. While student work has been the basis for a $115,000,000 HUD NDRC implementation grant, it is also true that, as in efforts outside academia, disciplinary silos keep professions ill-equipped to work successfully together. In a subject as vast as the planning of adaptation strategies, however, the only path forward is bringing the expertise of a wide array of knowledge types together; there is inadequate time for sequential disciplinary speculation. Next year, area professionals will join the design studio as well. It is hoped a new community of practice will emerge modeling effective transdisciplinarity.

Public Issues, Climate Justice, and Architecture
Bradford Grant, Howard University

Science, empirical evidence, and some technical solutions about global climate change are well documented and generally known to our upper-division architecture students who have taken the required Sustainability course. While our students may understand that the world’s climate is warming as an existential and profound threat for the future of our environment, we see that our thinking and action on climate change are influenced not only by science but by an array of social and political dynamics. How architects can help the client, profession, and the public’s understanding of the climate crisis, influence changes in policies for environmental equity and propose a climate change response is the direction of this course. Students’ understanding of their role as future professionals in the public process for climate change design policies, environmental justice, and a call for action, is the goal of the course.

Unthinking Oil: Public Architecture and the Post-Carbon Imaginary
Gabriel Fuentes, Daniela Shebitz, and Julia Nevarez, Kean University

Unthinking Oil: Public Architecture and the Post-Carbon Imaginary is a cross-disciplinary course to be taught in collaboration among the Kean University’s School of Public Architecture, School of Environmental and Sustainability Studies, School of Social Sciences, and the Human Rights Institute (HRI). Its aim is to intersect architecture with the emerging field of energy humanities in order to speculate openly and collectively on the broad political and aesthetic dimensions of climate change. Its guiding premise is that climate change is symptomatic of a deeper crisis of thought that requires transdisciplinary modes of critical analysis to unmask. Our fossil-fueled, petrocultural reality is not a mere techno-economic problem to be solved by mere techno-economic solutions; rather it is a deep cultural problem that entwines our social practices and energy uses with politically motivated representations and narratives about nature, modernity, and the environment. Petroculture operates in plain sight—post-industrial society is an oil society through and through. Climate change, then, is a symptom of a global carbon regime that permeates all aspects of our physical, material, intellectual, and affective lives. Change can only come by unthinking this regime and its infrastructures, by constructing new imaginaries of a post-carbon world. Paradoxically, unthinking requires deep thought.

Design Based on Estimating Ripple Effects of Carbon Footprint
Jeanne Homer, Khaled Mansy, John Phillips, and Tom Spector, Oklahoma State University

We are a group of faculty seeking the integration of the climate action goal of decarbonization into the design studio. We co-teach our school’s comprehensive design studio (required fourth-year studio), in which performance is emphasized as a principal driving force for design development. Students are challenged with the task of making their buildings as resource-efficient as possible. Students are required to seek evidence-based feedback to improve the performance of their design, i.e., structural, energy, and financial performance. Our endeavor is to redefine the educational goals of the studio to integrate carbon footprint as the primary measure of performance, which should open the door for students’ creativity in finding innovative ways to minimize carbon emissions due to both operational and embodied energy. The current content and scope of studio enable students to develop the understanding and ability to generate all of the evidence-based data required to evaluate building performance, but this data stops short of estimating the building’s carbon footprint. The next step is to explore ways to develop the studio further, pushing the envelope towards making it possible to estimate the ripple effects of carbon footprint and the (direct and indirect) impacts of buildings on climate change.

“Exist, Flourish, Evolve” — Territorial Care and the Upper Misi-ziibi
Gabriel Cuéllar, University of Minnesota

This studio is concerned with imagining how architecture, as a discipline, practice, and material reality, can help uphold the Rights of Nature. Exploring this emerging paradigm—codified in the phrase, “to exist, flourish, and evolve”—the studio will define concrete expressions of the ethics of care embodied in the recognition of rights for other-than-human entities. Our subject will be the Mississippi Headwaters watershed, whose ecological communities and dynamics will figure as protagonists in our studio. We will study how the “Great River” propelled Minnesota’s productivity and explore what role it, as a potential rights-bearing entity, might play in reshaping ecological and spatial relations. We will seek to account for biogeochemical interactions irreducible to human agency while identifying approaches to guide architectural intelligence within present environmental predicaments. We will rely on our discipline’s sensibility for mobilizing documents and precedents, identifying spatial relations, forming systems of coherence, and analyzing material characteristics and form. In parallel, we will chart out architectural efforts and effects embedded in situational contingencies that transpire over time, interact with other forces, and thrive as strictly infrastructural. Acknowledging that the Rights of Nature are, presently, written aspirations, our goal will be to articulate the architectural dimensions that could support them.

In addition, three-course proposals are receiving an Honorable Mention:

Changing Minds for a Changing Climate
Sara Stevens, Adam Rysanek, and Kees Lokman, University of British Columbia

Architecture and Environmental Orientalism in the Arab World
Faysal Tabbarah, American University of Sharjah

A Global Warming History of Architecture Since 1800
Hans Ibelings, University of Toronto

The winners were selected by members of the Buell Center’s Advisory Board. 

View the full course proposals online – HERE. 

About Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture

Columbia University’s Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture was founded in 1982. Its mission is to advance the interdisciplinary study of American architecture, urbanism, and landscape. A separately endowed entity within the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation, it sponsors research projects, workshops, public programs, publications, and awards.

The Center’s current project, “Power: Infrastructure in America,” which frames its support for the Course Development Prize, challenges participants to think about how infrastructure relates to life across a series of intersecting concerns, including democratic governance and climate justice. For more information, visit www.power.buellcenter.columbia.edu.

About ACSA

The mission of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture is to lead architectural education and research. Founded in 1912 by 10 charter members, ACSA is an international association of architecture schools preparing future architects, designers, and change agents. Our full members include all of the accredited professional degree programs in the United States and Canada, as well as international schools and 2- and 4-year programs. Together ACSA schools represent some 7,000 faculty educating more than 40,000 students.

ACSA seeks to empower faculty and schools to educate increasingly diverse students, expand disciplinary impacts, and create knowledge for the advancement of architecture. For more information, visit www.acsa-arch.org. 

Media Contact:
Amanda Gann
agann@acsa-arch.org

 

2020 ACSA Board Candidates and Results

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2020 ELECTION RESULTS

The ACSA Board of Directors is pleased to announce the results of the 2020 ACSA Election:

Second Vice President: Sharon Haar

Secretary/Treasurer: Antje Steinmuller

At-Large Director: Gundula Proksch

They will be joined by Sara Taketatsu (University of Colorado / AIAS) as the incoming ACSA Student Director.

Congratulations to all of the new board members.

Candidates and Online Voting

Below is information on the 2020 ACSA election, including candidate information. Official ballots were emailed to all full-member ACSA schools’ Faculty Councilors, who are the voting representatives. Faculty Councilors must complete the online ballot by close of business, February 7, 2020.

+ Download a single PDF of all candidates’ statements & short curricula vitae

2020  ACSA SECOND VICE PRESIDENT CANDIDATES

 

The Second Vice President will serve on the Board for a four-year term, beginning on July 1, 2020, with the first year served as Second Vice President, the second year served as First Vice President/President-Elect, the third year served as President, and the fourth year served as Past President. The links below include campaign statements written by each candidate and short curricula vitae.

Sharon Haar  
University of Michigan		Michaele Pride
University of New Mexico
2020 SECRETARY/TREASURER POSITION CANDIDATES

 

The Secretary/Treasurer serves as a voting member and officer of the Board of Director for a three-year term beginning July 1, 2020, and is responsible for the corporate and financial records of the Association. In fulfilling these responsibilities, the Secretary/Treasurer oversees preparation of minutes of meetings and maintenance of the Bylaws of the Association, the Rules of the Board of Directors, and other policy documents. The Secretary/Treasurer oversees the financial affairs of the organization by serving as Chair of the Finance Committee and working with the staff and independent accounting personal on organizational budgets, reports, and annual audits.

Ulrike Altenmüller-Lewis
Drexel University		Antje Steinmuller
California College of the Arts
2020 AT-LARGE DIRECTOR POSITION CANDIDATES

 

The At-Large Director serves for a three-year term, beginning on July 1, 2020. At-Large Directors serve as voting members of the Board. In addition, they have the following roles and responsibilities: (A) Liaison with Member Schools, including participating in organized business meetings; maintaining contact with Faculty Councilors and others associated with member schools; assisting member schools upon request; advising candidate or affiliated schools; and advising the Board of issues and concerns raised by members; (B) Contributing to the Work of the Board through actively serving on Board committees and contributing to collective deliberations; and (C) Performing Other Duties, as provided by the Rules of the Board of Directors or requested by the Board. The links below include campaign statements written by each candidate and short curricula vitae.

 
John Folan
University of Arkansas		Gundula Proksch
University of Washington

                                        

ACSA Election Process

 

ACSA Bylaws, Article VIII. Nominations, Elections, and Recall, Section 3: Election Process: “Elections shall be held in accordance with the Rules of the Board of Directors. Faculty Councilors of member schools shall be responsible for encouraging colleagues to express their views regarding candidates for Association elections, and shall submit the vote of the member school they represent on behalf of all members of the faculty. The Association shall announce the results of elections and appointments as soon as feasible, consistent with the Rules of the Board of Directors.”

The Faculty Councilor from each ACSA full-member school is the voting representative. Faculty Councilors must complete the online ballot by close of business, February 7, 2020.

+ Download a single PDF of all candidates’ statements & short curricula vitae

 

Timeline

January 9, 2020       Ballots emailed to all full-member schools, Faculty Councilors*
February 7, 2020      Deadline for receipt of completed online ballots
March 2020              Winners introduced at ACSA Annual Business Meeting in San Diego

 

* The Faculty Councilor from each ACSA full-member school is the voting representative and must complete the online ballot by close of business, February 7, 2020.

QUESTIONS

ACSA Info

Michelle Sturges
Membership Manager
202-785-2324
msturges@acsa-arch.org

Books of the Decade - AASL January Column

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AASL Column, January 2020
Lucy Campbell and Barbara Opar, column editors
Column by Barbara Opar

Books of the Decade

The end of a decade is always cause for both reflection and evaluation. That includes books. In late December of 2019, CNN posted online what they considered the most influential books of the decade. The article began with the statement that “A decade is in part defined by its books. And recent days have seen many roundups of the best books of the 2010s — the titles that critics consider the pinnacle of literary excellence.” (https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/30/entertainment/decades-most-influential-books-trnd/index.html.)

Some of CNN’s list was not surprising but still provocative. Included was Fifty Shades of Grey. Influential—yes. Of literary excellence—maybe not! I must also admit that I have not read a few of the titles on their list.  But that list served to make me wonder what architecture books would be considered the most influential of the past decade. And what defines influence?  Do already known authors continue to receive accolades and recommendations? Certainly, Rem Koolhaas fits that criteria. I have included several of his books on my list and feel that those titles are indeed ones with which most of you would agree.  How important are library circulation counts or Amazon best sellers in determining influence?  Do faculty referrals or use in academic course reserves trump general circulation? Some books receive high use in libraries or are cited for a few years but then seem to fade. Influence can derive from a combination of factors including traditional academic tracking like citation counts and mentions on social media. We must also consider that one title might generate interest in a topic (Atlas of Brutalist Architecture or Archigram: the book) and, as such, lead to more titles and expanded research in an area.  Ever notice how when one book comes out on a given topic more seem to follow.

Some of the specific titles below (Elements, Fundamentals, Project Japan) are ones that most everyone will agree have been influential. I presume, though, that not everyone will agree with all my choices. However, in considering the titles, I came to realize that certain topics stand out (net-zero or climate-related topics) or that certain publishers (DAMDI who published Program Diagrams) have made a substantial difference. When considering topics that generated a great deal of interest with respect to architecture during the course of the past decade, these came to mind: climate change, net-zero energy design, sustainability, building materials, the small house movement, modern architectural movements such as the Bauhaus, Brutalism, and metabolism. Some topics will always dominate the discipline such as architectural detailing (De-tail –kultur). Certain authors—Farshid Moussavi being one—have written works on architecture that have been and continue to be influential in teaching.  The Function of Style—while not as popular here as her Function of Form or Function of Ornament- is nonetheless an important title. Jimenez’s book is a graphic novel—a highly original topic in architecture. Books on individual projects are not frequent, but when they appear such as The High Line they prove to be of great use. My last selection is a new edition of Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture, a title surely on everyone’s list of influential architecture books of the past century.

As we enter the next decade new Bauhaus books are being issued on its 100th anniversary. These, as well as topics yet to be envisioned, will make up the most influential books of the next decade.

But without further ado, here is my list of the most influential architecture books of 2010-2020.

The List:

BIG Bjarke Ingels Group. Hot to cold: An Odyssey of Architectural Adaptation. Köln: Taschen, 2015.

Chalk, Warren. Archigram: the book. London: Circa Press, 2018.

Hootman, Thomas. Net Zero Energy Design: A Guide for Commercial Architecture.  Hoboken, N.J: John Wiley & Sons, 2013.

Koolhaas, Rem. Elements. Venice: Marsilio, 2014.

Koolhaas, Rem. Fundamentals: 14th International Architecture Exhibition. Venice: Marsilio, 2014.

Koolhaas, Rem. Project Japan: Metabolism Talks. Köln: TASCHEN GmbH, 2011.

Kumpusch, Christoph A. De-tail– kultur: if buildings had DNA : case studies of mutations: the complex behavior of collective detail, 10 lenses, 12+1 projects. Beijing: AADCU Program, 2016. 

James Corner Field Operations. The High Line: Foreseen, Unforeseen. New York: Phaidon, 2015.

Lai, Jimenez. Citizens of no place: An Architectural Graphic Novel.  New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2012.

Lewis, Paul. Manual of Section. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2016.

Metaborizumu no mirai toshi = Metabolism, The City of the Future. Tōkyō: Shinkenchikusha, 2011.

Moussavi, Farshid. The Function of Style. New York: Actar, 2014.

Mostafavi, Mohsen. Ecological Urbanism. Baden, Switzerland: Lars Müller, 2010.

Pyo, Miyoung. Program Diagrams. Seoul: DAMDI, 2011.

Venturi, Robert. Robert Venturi’s Complexity and Contradiction at Fifty. New York: The Museum of Modern Art, 2019.

 

Pennsylvania State University

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UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Vincent Morales Garoffolo and Juan Antonio Sánchez Muñoz, principals of KAUH arquitectura & paisajismo in Granada, Spain, will speak on Wednesday, Jan. 29 as part of the Penn State Stuckeman School’s Lecture and Exhibit Series. “The Possibility of Architecture: A collection of works” will be held at 6 p.m. in the Stuckeman Family Building Jury Space and is free and open to the public.

As a firm, KAUH integrates architecture, public space and landscape design for both public and private clients. Morales Garoffolo and Sánchez Muñoz operate on the assumption that there are possibilities and impossibilities for every project. They also believe in the perceptive experience their work generates within the construction of the environment.

The duo has stated that a project can be found anywhere and can come to be out of any action, which blends in with KAUH’s foremost interest: to add value and enhance what belongs to everyone as the places in which we all interact – the spaces in which what is public can be expressed.

Some of KAUH’s most recent work includes the public space intervention “Outline of the Nasrid House” within the Alhambra, a palace and fortress complex in Granada, and a family-run hotel in the coastal town of Conil de la Frontera in the province of Cádiz. Construction is about to begin of the firm’s urban and infrastructure renewal project of the Utrera fairgrounds in Seville, and Morales Garoffolo and Sánchez Muñoz will be developing the design of La Hoya park this year, the result of their proposal winning an international competition focusing on the spaces surrounding the historic Alcazaba in Almería.

The firm has received numerous awards and accolades for its work, including the Torres Clavé Award from the Official College of Architects of Cádiz for the design of 20 social housing units in Conil de la Frontera. That project was also selected for the 13th Spanish Architecture and Urbanism Biennale in 2015. KAUH was also the recipient of a Málaga Architecture Award from the Official College of Architects of Málaga (Spain) in 2009.

Morales Garoffolo and Sánchez Muñoz received their architecture degrees from the Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura de Sevilla in 2003 and shortly thereafter established kauh arquitectos in Seville in 2004. In 2012, the firm changed its name to KAUH arquitectura & paisajismo and moved its operations to Granada in Andalusia region. They are licensed architects registered at the Colegio de Arquitectos of Granada.

Morales Garoffolo and Sánchez Muñoz have participated as jury members, committee members and conference speakers and have authored numerous articles and chapters on architecture and design theory. They joined the Department of Architecture at Penn State this semester as visiting faculty.

Pennsylvania State University

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UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – A book edited by Alexandra Staub, professor of architecture at Penn State, that reframes the discussion of modernity, space and gender is currently one of Routledge’s best-selling books on architecture.

In “The Routledge Companion to Modernity, Space and Gender,” Staub examines how “modernity” has been defined in various cultural contexts of the 20th and 21st centuries, how this definition has been expressed spatially and architecturally, and what effect this has had on women in their everyday lives.

Published in 2018, the volume presents theories and methods for understanding space and gender as they relate to the development of cities, urban spaces and individual building types in both the creation of and resistance to social transformations and modern global capitalism.

Staub is also the author of “Conflicted Identities: Housing and the Politics of Cultural Representation,” which was published by Routledge in 2015.

A member of the Taylor & Francis Group, Routledge is regarded as the world’s leading publisher in the humanities and social sciences.

Call for Nominations: NAAB Visiting Team Roster

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CALL FOR NOMINATIONS

2020 ACSA Representatives on NAAB Visiting Team Roster

 

Deadline: February 19, 2020

 

The ACSA Board of Directors seeks nominees for 2020 ACSA representatives on the National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB) school visiting team roster for a term of four years. The final selection of faculty members participating in the visiting teams will be made by NAAB. 

Nominating Procedure 

  1. The ACSA Board of Directors shall annually approve a roster of members eligible to serve as educator representatives on NAAB Visiting Teams for a term of four years. 
  2. ACSA publishes a call for nominations from the membership via the ACSA website and emails. Nominations and self-nominations must include a cover letter outlining the candidate’s relevant experience and a 2-page curriculum vitae.
  3. The ACSA Nominations Committee shall review all nominations and recommend candidates for inclusion on the visiting team roster to the ACSA board.

Candidate Qualifications

The candidate must be a full-time faculty member at an ACSA full or candidate member school at the time of nomination. 

The candidate should demonstrate a number of the following preferred qualifications:

  • Reasonable length and breadth of full-time teaching experience;
  • Experience with educational assessment, particularly self-assessment by programs;
  • A record of acknowledged scholarship or professional work;
  • Administrative experience; and
  • An association with multiple schools.

The candidate must be willing and available to participate in a required in-person accreditation team training conducted by NAAB.

ACSA Nominee Selection

The Nominations Committee and Board of Directors will consider a variety of factors when evaluating candidates and recommending a slate of individuals for the Visiting Team Roster. These factors may include but are not limited to accreditation and assessment experience, geographic distribution, institutional setting, gender, and racial/ethnic diversity, and record of administration and/or scholarship. As such, selected candidates may not completely match all the criteria listed above.  

Submitting Nominations and Self-Nominations

For consideration, please submit a concise letter of nomination or self-nomination outlining the nominee’s interest and experience, a two-page CV indicating the nominee’s experience with accreditation, and, if not a self-nomination, a letter from the nominee indicating a willingness to serve. Materials are due by February 19, 2020.

ACSA will notify those nominees whose names will be forwarded to NAAB by May 2020. Follow up from NAAB about training and the next steps will come in the ensuing months. 

Nominations should be sent by email attachment in PDF format to Michelle Sturges, Membership Manager, msturges@acsa-arch.org. Subject Line: NAAB Visiting Teams.

Call for Nominations: 2020 NAAB Board of Directors

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CALL FOR NOMINATIONS

2020 ACSA Appointee to the NAAB Board of Directors


Deadline: February 19, 2020

 

The ACSA Nominations Committee invites nominations for one appointee to the NAAB Board of Directors. The National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB) is comprised of thirteen members: three appointed by ACSA, three appointed by AIA, three appointed by NCARB, two appointed by AIAS, and two public members. Currently, John Cays (New Jersey Institute of Technology), Marilys Nepomechie (Florida International University), and Rebecca O’Neal Dagg (Auburn University) are the ACSA appointees to the NAAB Board. 

The appointment is for a three-year term (October 2020 – October 2023) and calls for a person willing and able to make a commitment to NAAB. Previous experience with ACSA as a board member or volunteer is considered helpful but is not required for nomination. Similarly, experience on NAAB visiting teams is considered helpful but not a requirement. NAAB is in the process of revising its accreditation conditions and procedures to rely more on program self-assessment. Relevant experience with educational assessment and self-assessment is thus desirable. Faculty and administrators are invited to nominate faculty from an ACSA full member school with some or all of the following qualifications:

  1. Tenured faculty status at an ACSA full member school;
  2. Significant experience with and knowledge of the accreditation process;
  3. Significant acquaintance with and knowledge of ACSA, its history, programs, and administrative structure;
  4. Significant acquaintance with the range of school and program types across North America;
  5. Willingness to represent the constituency of ACSA on accreditation-related issues; and
  6. Ability to work with the NAAB and ACSA boards to build consensus on accreditation-related issues.

For consideration, please submit a concise letter of nomination or self-nomination outlining the nominee’s interest and experience, a two-page CV indicating the nominee’s experience under the above headings, and, if not a self-nomination, a letter from the nominee indicating a willingness to serve. Materials are due by February 19, 2020.

Nominations should be sent by email attachment in PDF format to Michelle Sturges, Membership Manager, msturges@acsa-arch.org. Subject Line: NAAB Director. 

Pennsylvania State University

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UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Nearly 20 international scholars will come together at the Stuckeman Family Building later this month to discuss how historians and scholars have processed Italy’s sustained importance for architecture and its history over the 20th century.

Hosted jointly by the Stuckeman School and the Department of Architecture, “Italian Imprints: Issues and Influences in Architecture Culture in the Long Twentieth Century,” focuses both on how Italian architects and architecture have influenced architectural ideas and practice around the world, and on cases that throw that same influence into relief.

The event, which will be held Jan.16-18, has been organized by Denise Costanzo, assistant professor of architecture, and Andrew Leach, associate dean for research and professor of architecture at the University of Sydney who was named the 2019-20 Professor of Interdisciplinary Design by the Stuckeman School.

The symposium grew from Leach’s and Costanzo’s mutual interest in the place of Italian architecture in 20th century architectural criticism, history and practice.

For centuries, architects have made themselves familiar with Italy’s patrimony, from antiquity to the baroque. However, according to Leach and Costanzo, the assumption of Italy’s singular importance has been tempered by debate in architectural history, which has fostered an expansion of its scope beyond the once dominant European and North American spheres.

“This is an exciting development for the discipline, but it also means scholars must be prepared to approach Italian topics in new ways and for different reasons,” Costanzo said. “The symposium will demonstrate how a broader intellectual conversation enriches and deepens how we view Italy’s architectural influence.”

The event will include keynote lectures by world-renowned scholars of Italian architecture Dian Ghirardo, professor of architecture at the University of Southern California, and Maristella Casciato, senior curator of architectural collections at the Getty Research Institute.

Along with the keynote talks, guest speakers will discuss the wider impact of Italian architectural exhibitions from how the study of Italian architecture informs our thinking on climate change to what the Renaissance’s ties are to modern life.

According to Leach, the event will engage anyone interested in design, art and Italy’s cultural history.

“The speakers will explore Italy’s enduring pull on our imaginations and its importance to artists while reflecting on why this setting in particular remains such a vivid touchstone in an age of undifferentiated global access to precedents and ideas,” he said.

Costanzo and Leach hope those attending will leave the event with a better sense of how historians grapple with architecture, as well as with the ideas that have shaped the writing of architectural history over generations.

For more information and details regarding the Italian Imprints symposium, which is free and open to the public, please visit: https://sites.psu.edu/italianimprints/.

Your Architecture Holiday Gift Guide

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AASL Column, December 2019
Lucy Campbell and Barbara Opar, column editors
Column by Barbara Opar

Your Architecture Holiday Gift Guide

Another year has come and gone. The good news is that for many, this is a time for you to gift others or enjoy something bought for you. For the past two years, the December AASL column has presented a list of notable architecture books. Based on your feedback, we are doing it once more. Here are this year’s selections:

Bernheimer, Lily. Shaping of Us: How Everyday Spaces Structure Our Lives, Behavior, and Well-Being. San Antonio, TX: Trinity University Press, 2019 ISBN:9781595348722. 336 Pages. $26.95

In an engaging work, Lily Bernheimer explores the interactions people have with the spaces around them. 

Bradbury, Dominic. Atlas of Mid-Century Modern Houses. London: Phaidon Press, 2019. ISBN: 978-0714876740. 440 pages. $96.99

Midcentury modern is again in fashion. Bradbury’s book is a well-researched tome on the topic, spanning iconic and lesser-known examples. 

Bradbury, Dominic. Off the Grid: Houses for Escape. London: Thames and Hudson, 2019. ISBN: 9780500021422. 272 pages. $45.00

Bradbury explores extreme architecture, including remote cabins in the North and seaside retreats. More than an escapist title, the book shows how architects are responding to sustainability and creating new and liberating ways of life. 

Follett, Ken. Notre-Dame: A Short History of the Meaning of Cathedrals. New York: Viking, 2019. ISBN: 9781984880253. 80 pages. $11.90 

Novelist Ken Follett’s personal account of witnessing Notre Dame in flames, followed by a brief history of this masterpiece. 

Gropius, Walter, ed. Walter Gropius: International Architecture. Zurich: Lars Müller Publishers, 2019. ISBN: 9783037785843. 106 pages. $45.00

One of a number of important translations appearing in the 100th year anniversary of the Bauhaus.  

Hall, Jane. Breaking Ground: Architecture by Women. London: Phaidon Press, 2019. ISBN: 978-0714879277. 224 pages. $41.57

Halls presents the reader with a stunning visual survey of 200 of the best buildings designed by women architects.

Hendrickson, Paul. Plagued by Fire: The Dreams and Furies of Frank Lloyd Wright. New York: Knopf, 2019. ISBN: 9780385353656. 624 pages. $31.50

Frank Lloyd Wright comes alive in a new biography that depicts a Wright haunted by some of the choices he made. 

Hu, Ming. Net Zero Energy Building: Predicted and Unintended Consequences. New York: Routledge, 2019. ISBN: 9780815367802. 161 pages. $39.95 (paperback)

The author studies energy efficiency, energy impact and environment concerns in a thoughtful title important to those in both practice and teaching. 

Lazrus, Paula Kay. Building the Italian Renaissance: Brunelleschi’s Dome and the Florence Cathedral. New York: Reacting Consortium Press, 2019. ISBN: 9781469653396. 92 pages. $30.00 

Do you teach about the Italian Renaissance? This title serves as an interesting way for students to learn about the final stage in the completion of Brunelleschi’s masterpiece.

Oppenheim. Lair: Radical Homes and Hideouts of Movie Villains. Miami: Tra Publishing, 2019. ISBN: 978-1732297869. 290 pages. $75.00

Want to check out something fun this holiday? Then this book is for you. It covers 15 unique houses from movies including Northwest by Northwest. 

Roberts, Sam. A History of New York in 27 Buildings: The 400-Year Untold Story of an American Metropolis. London: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2019. ISBN: 9781620409800. 304 pages. $28.00 

Sam Roberts of the New York Times discusses 27 of the most iconic New York City buildings.

Satow, Julie. The Plaza: The Secret Life of America’s Most Famous Hotel. New York: Twelve, 2019. ISBN: 9781455566679. 358 pages. $29.00 

A behind-the-scenes look at an iconic building, this book shows how for many The Plaza serves as a concrete example of power and prestige.   

Williams, Austin. New Chinese Architecture: Twenty Women Building the Future. London: Thames & Hudson, 2019. ISBN: 9780500343388. 256 pages. $45.00

Fifty key projects across China by both established and emerging women architects illustrate the changing landscape of Chinese architecture.  

Zamora, Francesc. 150 Best Tiny Space Ideas. NYC, NY: Harper Design, 2019 ISBN13: 978-0062909220. 480 pages. $29.99

Innovative examples of dwellings under 450 square feet are unveiled in this well-illustrated work. 

And lastly, for those feeling rich or who have a really supportive relative, you might want to consider these titles:

Bambach, Carmen C. Leonardo da Vinci Rediscovered. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2019. ISBN: 9780300191950. 2200 pages $382.28

On the 500th anniversary of the artist’s death, Carmen Bambach presents a new interpretation of the life, work, and legacy of Leonard da Vinci.

Chattopadhyay, Swati. The Routledge Companion to Critical Approaches to Contemporary Architecture. New York: Routledge, 2019. ISBN: 9781138917569. 488 pages. $194.70

Current architectural thought is discussed by thirty-six contributors who present a range of the different themes and views that impact architecture today.  

Singha, Sumita, ed. Women in Architecture. New York: Routledge, 2019. ISBN: 9781138832930. 1,436 pages. $1390.00

Advertised as presenting a holistic, non-Eurocentric view of women in architecture, this is a major new reference work in the field of architecture. 

University at Buffalo

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Department of Architecture, University at Buffalo.

ACSA News – December 2019

Assistant Professor Charles Davis’s book “Building Character: The Racial Politics of Modern Architectural Style” was recently published by University of Pittsburgh Press. A link is also available to a podcast interview with Professor Davis about the book for ‘Interstitial’.

Associate Professor Joyce Hwang was invited to give a lecture entitled “Architecture for the Collective” at Purdue University in November. The lecture, entitled “Architecture for the Collective” was part of the “Solutions Lab.” program at the Honors College.

Associate Professor Joyce Hwang presented at the 2019 ACSA Administrators Conference in the panel “Emerging Models of Individual and Collaborative Research” convened by Richard Sommer, Dean of the Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape and Design at the University of Toronto.

Associate Professor Omar Khan was appointed as an External Examiner for the M. Arch Program Design for Performance and Interaction and served as guest critic in December 2019 for final reviews at The Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London.

Professor Brian Carter’s review of the recently completed rammed earth buildings and new landscapes at Bushey Cemetery was published in ‘Faith & Form’ 3/2019.

Assistant Professor Chris Romano’s Light/Station received an Editor’ Choice Award from Architect’s Newspaper for the 2019 Best of Products in the Façade category.

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