MS.AAD GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, PLANNING, AND PRESERVATION
Master of Science in Advanced Architectural Design
1.0 Program Overview Enrique Walker, Director
The Master of Science degree in Advanced Architectural Design is a threeterm program consisting of summer, autumn, and spring terms. The objective of the program is to provide outstanding young professionals who hold a Bachelor of Architecture or Master of Architecture degree the opportunity to enter into an intensive, postgraduate study that encourages critical thought in the context of design speculation. The program is viewed as a framework in which both academic and professional concerns are explored. Overall, the program emphasizes an experimental approach to research and architectural design rigorously grounded in multiple, complex realities. Specifically, the program seeks to: 1. Address the challenges and possibilities of global urbanization by exploring the city—and its architecture—in all its forms. 2. Engage in a complex definition of architecture, from the questioning of the program to the formulation of design strategies. 3. Produce architectural objects—both digital and physical—which reflect an 1
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open, critical engagement both with new and existing technologies. 4. Articulate architecture as a cultural practice that combines critical thought, design experimentation, and ethical responsibilities in an interdisciplinary milieu. 5. Activate a wide debate on the contemporary conditions that critically affect the course of the discipline and the profession. The program brings together a set of required studios with elective courses that are shared with other programs in the School and that promote intellectual cross-fertilization among disciplines. A required lecture course on the twentieth-century city and on contemporary architectural theory, exclusive to the program, provides grounding for disciplinary exploration in the studio. The advanced studios frequently utilize New York as a design laboratory—a global city that presents both unique challenges and unique opportunities. The program has long been a site for architects from around the globe to test concepts and confront changes that affect architecture and cities worldwide.
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2.0 Curriculum The program is viewed as a framework in which both academic and professional concerns are explored. A set of required studios and courses is enhanced by limited and open electives that are shared with other programs in the School and that promote intellectual cross-fertilization among disciplines. A required lecture course on the twentieth-century city and contemporary theory, exclusive to the program, provides grounding for architectural exploration in the studio. “Limited electives’’ are those School offerings designated as appropriate by the director. “Open electives’’ are graduate-level courses of the student’s choice. Fall and spring studios are shared with final-year Master of Architecture students. In order to encourage the practical and conceptual integration of the computer in design work, AAD studios will take full advantage of the School’s computer facilities. Program Requirements: The M.S. degree in Architecture and Advanced Architectural Design requires 45 points in the following curriculum. (A minimum 3
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of 12 points must be taken each semester.) Summer Term: Design Studio, 9 pts | Metropolis, 3 pts | Digital Craft, 3 pts | Arguments, 3 pts Autumn Term: A4005 Design studio, II 9 pts | 2 limited electives 6 pts Spring Term: A4006 Design studio, III 9 pts | Limited elective 3 pts | Open elective 3 pts Total: 45 pts Note: Students are strongly advised to take one additional 3- or 4-point elective during each term. No extra tuition is charged between 15 and 19 points. Courses may be dropped until the tenth week into the semester for fall and spring terms. Summer courses may be dropped until two-thirds of the class meetings have been held.
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3.0 Visual Studies Course Listings Techniques of the UltraReal Kevin Cimini and Chris Hoxie The architectural rendering—be it photo-realistic, analytic, or abstract— captures the energy of an idea about space and the forces that act within it. The challenge is to convey that dynamism—whether it is the movement of a set of bodies, a change in lighting and material qualities, or any other dynamic quality of architecture—with a set of static images. The multiple techniques and tactics of rendering—sketch, visualize, analyze, quantify, synthesize—have enabled the contemporary architect to embed more information, with greater intent, into a single image. Topological Study of Form Jose Sanchez This workshop focuses on the topological study of form. Understanding form as a composite of mathematical data, we can start to investigate the underlining structure of post-Euclidian geometry. We will also study fluid dynamics as a morphological system, as opposed to the normative approach or regarding fluids as vectorbased systems. Finally, we will analyze how the generative morphological behavior of Fractals can generate ‘structures’ of form that incorporate space-form relations.
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Living Architecture 01 David Benjamin and Soo-in Yang Together we will bring architecture to life. Our hands-on laboratory will unfreeze buildings and create functioning interactive environments. The class offers an immersive introduction to the issues of responsive kinetic architecture and the techniques of designing with electronic circuits. By the end of the semester, students will build a range of exciting full-scale demonstrations for an exhibit at the school or at a New York gallery. We will use the standard building blocks of inexpensive sensors, simple microcontrollers, and shape memory alloy actuators to jump-start the process of designing with electronics. Students will be able to use these modular components without extensive training or a laboratory infrastructure. No prior experience is necessary. Dynalloy, the manufacturer of Flexinol shape memory alloy actuators, has agreed to donate materials for the class. • To explore interactive environments based on movement • To design through full-scale prototyping • To develop the ability to break down complex systems into testable modules
Cinematic Communication Jason Ivaliotis Course Overview & Objectives The evolution of digital visualization over the last decade has enabled designers to articulate powerful visions of space, manipulate components, isolate significant moments and generate provocative renderings of a given space at a given time. Often, the generative process of digital modeling remains exclusively in the hands of the creator with the potential of these virtual environments frozen in the presentation of a static image or a scripted animation. In this way, there has been an inherent disconnect between the intelligence embedded within the dynamic process of generating 3D virtual environments and the presentation of static CGI images which are meant to represent them. This course will blur the line between process and product where the virtual model acts as both a generative design tool as well as a dynamic interactive simulation that is able to exhibit changes in geometry, object lighting and material quality of the virtual environment in real time. In this manner the audience can become the designer and the designer the audience. In this course we will unfreeze still images and bring virtual environments to life.
We will exploit the capabilities of the Vray RT real time rendering technology to increase speed and efficiency of visualization, providing students with the tools and optimal modeling procedures necessary to formulate a conceptual design strategy, construct a virtual model and produce a provocative rendered simulation. A4676 - Architectural Photography 01 Erieta Attali The scope of this course focuses on using the medium of architectural photography as a critical tool for analyzing and representing buildings. By contextualizing and framing the relationship between an architect and his or her work, it becomes easier to understand the intent behind the design process. Architectural photography helps us to understand the creator’s ideas and intentions, and can provide us with insights into a building’s meaning. It provides us not only with documentary evidence but also serves as a stimulant for the critical mind. On a practical level, the class teaches soon-to-be architects what to expect and what to desire from documentation of buildings they might design in the future.
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A4711 - Search: Advanced Algorithmic Design Mark Collins and Toru Hasegawa This workshop will explore generative design methodologies through the application of algorithmic techniques. More specifically, we will be looking at fundamental coding principles (recursion, feedback, modularity and I/O) while teasing out a rich taxonomy of algorithmic techniques. Artificial life, material intelligence, interactivity, and other second-order principles will be approached from the vantage point of “dynamics” and “search” – or the introduction of directed intelligence into a dynamic process of making. As we continue to ‘feedback’ experience from previous iterations of the course, we will be focusing this semester on the interrelationship between “development” and “behavior” against a backdrop of population dynamics, search spaces and fitness landscapes. A4730 - Adaptive Formulations 01 Guy Snover Researchers in fields like Biomimetrics and Systems Engineering have discovered relationships embedded within complex systems of seemingly unrelated components or, in the case of natural systems, plant and animal life. These relationships (and depen-
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dencies) can be shown to enhance the whole, perhaps improving the resiliency of the system to changing conditions or improving efficiency and reducing waste of limited resources. Another common theme in complex systems, particularly natural systems, is adaptive growth. They respond to specific demands and environmental conditions present during their formation. A4715 - Re-Thinking BIM Mark Green What is the place of BIM in architecture? Is it only meant for production, or can architectural design benefit from the real time feedback available from Building Information Models. BIM can, and will change the profession, this generation is responsible for how that will be. Not having to deal with professional demands, students will be able to explore BIM strategies which in the work place are not possible. These virtual buildings are requiring that architects be much more aware of all aspects of design. A4743- Animated Comp. 02 - Maya Chris Whitelaw Geometries + Envelopes is an introduction to 3D digital modeling using Autodesk’s Maya. This 6 week
MS.AAD Degree Requirements
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workshop will introduce a full suite of production-proven tools and work flows for the creation, manipulation and translation of Polygon, NURBS and Subdivision Surface geometry. Field of Play: Agency in Mapping Site Brian Brush Mapping is a key component to site investigation as these recording inform design by allowing designers to make spatial relationship that might not have been otherwise explored. Architects, Urban Designers, and Urban Planners have long used maps to understand complex contextual relationships on site and have used these maps to develop designs as well as policies. Google has changed the way people interact with maps and has made spatial information more widely available. At the same time traditional mapping programs such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS) provide us with complex contextual information that can not be obtained through online mapping systems line Google. Advancements in sensor technologies have also made it easier for designers to develop their own spatially referenced data.
A4542 - Imagining the UltraReal Kevin Cimini and Chris Hoxie As a means of communication, no other visual media rivals the short animation in its efficacy. It can make you laugh, cry, be horrified, believe, and disbelieve, all within 30 seconds. The unique structure—linear time, filmic juxtapositions, narrative and abstract composition—has become the drawing of contemporary architecture and design. Kinetic by nature, animation can reveal the way in which an architectural space changes over the time. Change occurs in multiple ways: it may be motion of bodies in space; it could be the dynamic quality of light and materials; it might be that it is imperceptible under “normal” conditions, either too slow or too fast for our senses—but that change can be revealed through the use of animation. A4525 - Simulation as the Origin of Tangible Form Jose Sanchez In this workshop we will study the generation of visual constructs dealing with the notion of simulation and representation. We undertake on simulation as the origin of a reality, not as a representation of a formal construct, by generating behavioral models and abstract events without
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a tactile origin. The simulation gives origin to sequential representation of an unknown event that progressively yields to the generation of a tangible visual fabric.
the drawing and, through it, the robot. The degree of control of the drawing, of authorship, is at various levels of remove and, as our skills, techniques and technologies evolve, in flux.
A4720 – Meshing Zach Downey As the architect’s computer switches modalities from a tool that integrates design AND the production of data for actualization, new processes and techniques to more capably take advantage of this shift must be explored and skillfully utilized. This workshop will challenge traditional methods of drafting and physical model building and explore a more parametric approach. Virtual 3d models will be drafted and subjected to multiple iterative transformations and tested for design fitness in the realm of the software AND output for testing in real space.
Parametric Realizations Mark Bearak and Brigitte Borders Parametric Realizations: exploring the intrinsic relationship between parametric algorithms and material explorations. Parametric modelers are commonly used in the development of digital architectural models, but they are rarely taken to the point of becoming physical realities. This course will look at the process of generating parametric algorithms then turning those models into physical realities. Students will work in groups to design an installation that will be the physical realization of their scripted protocol.
A4748 - Special Topics in Fabrication: Formworks Josh Draper Digital Fabrication is a hybrid organism whose geneaology lies in robotics and drawing. Every machine we use is a kind of drawing robot. The laser cutter makes drawings by cutting and scoring as does the waterjet. The 3 axis routers carve their marks while the 3d printers accrete theirs. As designers, we remotely control
A4793 - APP- itecture Mark Collins and Toru Hasegawa Beyond its status as must-have consumer product, the iPhone is also an expansive platform for spatial computation. Taking on the role of software developer, architects are well-poised to deliver compelling experiences that build strong connections between information and space. Space can be mapped, tagged, generated, shared and
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experienced through the device’s considerable sensing and processing capabilities - the platform allows one to design experiences and generative spaces that are simultaneously embedded in worlds both real and virtual. The goal of this seminar is for each student to develop a “spatial app� (a loose description that means to stimulate thinking on the notion of mobile and embedded technology) that ultimately will be distributed on the Apple App Store at the conclusion of the workshop A4141- Beyond Prototype Jason Ivaliotis The relationship between the components of structure and the components of enclosure is conventionally considered to be mutually exclusive. However, in an environment where material efficiency and speed of fabrication is becoming more important, there exists an opportunity for the architect to intervene within the fabrication process to assimilate both structure and envelope into one hybridized system that abolishes exclusivity and attains a higher level of efficiency. This course will encourage and enable students to use digital software as a generative tool and the laser cutter, CNC Mill, plastic bender and welder as a means to bring virtual systems into the physical realm. Emphasis will be
placed on using the digital fabrication machines to extract forms from conventional, flat sheet stock that can be transformed using cutting, bending and folded manipulation in order to create a topological network of elements: a homogenous, self supporting mesh. Structural elements will be formed from a sheet material which in raw form is not stable as a stand alone building component. We will create structure from non structure and complex systems from simple surfaces. Special emphasis will be placed on the development of connection details and their incorporation into the overall language of the network. In this way the students will be able to explore and design a complex, homogenous network or mesh of a single material that performs efficiently as both structure and enclosure. We will study the complexities of transforming non uniform NURBS geometry with superimposed surface tessellation, into a three dimensional network. This generative process will be employed as a strategy for developing new architectural component systems. Specific emphasis will be placed on the use of multiple systems of geometry within the same structural network in order to discern elements of surface and elements of connection.
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4.0 Labs Columbia Laboratory For Architectural Broadcasting Jeffrey Inaba The mission of CLAB is to test experimental forms of architectural communication. Rethinking architecture at a global scale, the lab sets up creative partnerships to broaden the range and increase the intensity of architectural discourse - launching unique events, provisional networks, special issues of magazines, video streams, television, radio and webcasts. The lab acts as a kind of training camp and energy source for incubating new channels for debate about architecture. Laboratory for Applied Building Science Phillip Anzalone The shift toward more expansive forms of digital production within the design and construction industry affords opportunities of not only reconfiguring the relationships between the key players, but also incorporating industry sectors not typically associated with building construction. At the core of this shift is the integration of communication through various forms of digital networks, CNC fabrication being just one among many, with the ambition of developing a comprehensive, well organized, easily accessible, and parametrically adaptable body of information that coordinates the process from design through a building’s lifecycle. This is the broader context for the goals of the Laboratory for Applied Building Science. Spatial Information Design Lab Laura Kurgan, Sarah Williams The GSAPP Spatial Information Design Lab is a think- and action-tank for the visual display of spatial information. Its founding and ongoing project has been a university wide one, to develop a meta-data standard for the growing 15
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archive of GIS data, and a suitable interface for this kind of spatial data. The lab will take a productive and yet critical approach to the field of GIS, and work with spatial data to design innovative ways in which the resulting images, or maps, might communicate what they picture with clarity, integrity, responsibility, creativity and invention. China Megacities Lab Jeffrey Johnson Over the next 25 years, it is projected that China will account for 50% of the world’s new construction. The majority of this construction will occur in existing cities, or newly formed urban areas. It is the mission of the China Megacities Lab to become actively engaged with this rapid urbanization and spatial production occurring in China, through both research and design. Urban Design Lab Richard Plunz The Urban Design Lab (UDL) of the EARTH INSTITUTE and the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP) works to find innovative solutions to the sustainable development issues confronting cities. The UDL conducts multidisciplinary applied design research in collaboration with community-based organizations and other public and private interests. The UDL’s team works closely with outside experts in architecture, ecology, economics, environmental science, public health, urban design and urban planning. Living Architecture Lab David Benjamin, Soo-In Yang Political and cultural conditions change: what if the walls and windows
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morphed in response? Air and water quality fluctuate: what if a cloud of light above the river modulated its color as a public display of contamination? Demands for occupation of space shift across days, seasons, and years: what if traditionally mute and inert building materials appeared and disappeared accordingly? Urban Landscape Lab Janette Kim, Katherine Orff The Urban Landscape Lab is an interdisciplinary applied research group at Columbia University in the City of New York. We focus on the role of design in the analysis and transformation of the joint built-natural environment, and study ecological processes and urban systems as hybrid phenomenon through targeted pilot projects, practical strategies, and experiments. Non Linear Solutions Unit Caterina Tiazzoldi In a complex-structured city in which the interactions among parts intensify; in which the number of decision makers and cultural scenarios overlap, interconnect, and sometimes collide; in which the temporal dimensions of the citizens are dissimilar; in which local and global, physical and virtual dimensions co-exist, it is necessary to identify a set of design tools which could respond to design complexity. That is why in the last fifteen years, architects adopted advanced digital tools such as algorithms, dynamic relationships, parametric systems, mapping, morphogenesis, cellular automata, and bifurcation with broken symmetry. Network Architecture Lab Kazys Varnelis Directed by Kazys Varnelis, the Network Architecture Lab is an experimental unit that embraces the studio and the seminar as venues for architectural analysis and speculation, exploring new forms of research through architecture, text, new media design, film production and environment design.
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Conservation Labratory George Wheeler The Conservation Laboratory serves as the primary teaching venue for conservation courses where lectures, demonstrations, and practicums take place. It supports such courses as Structures, Systems and Materials Iⅈ Architectural Metals; American Architectural Finishes; Concrete, Cast Stone & Mortar; Stone, Brick & Terracotta; Conservation Workshop; and is the fundamental locus for Basic Conservation Science and Laboratory course. Thesis research is also conducted in the laboratory. Technological Change Lab (TCLab) Smita Srinivas TCLab is a Columbia university-based research and advisory program established in 2007 and directed by Prof. SMITA SRINIVAS of the Urban Planning program. It is housed at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP). The Community & Capital Action Research Lab (C2ARL) Stacey Sutton The Community & Capital Action Research Lab (C2ARL) provides an infrastructure for cutting-edge research, critical discourse, and empirically informed practice on fundamental questions related to the incessant tension between the needs of community and the imperatives of capital. The Latin American and Caribbean Laboratory Clara Irazabal The Latin Lab serves as an intellectual platform for all the research, pedagogical, and service initiatives undertaken by GSAPP community related to Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). Latin Lab explores the complex and dichotomous dynamics of urban development in LAC. Rather than approach LAC as a homogeneous super-region, Latin Lab examines and understands LAC as a cosmology of large urban concentrations, small municipalities, and re-territorialized diasporas, built upon an overlay of identities, each with local and global networks resilient to simplification and regionalization. COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY GSAPP
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5.0 Advanced Architectural Research (AAR) To more directly involve these research laboratories in the educational mission of the school, GSAPP offers a program in Advanced Architectural Research (AAR) for graduates who have completed degrees in the Master of Science Advanced Architectural Design (MSAAD), Master of Architecture and Urban Design (MSAUD), and Master of Architecture (MARCH). Advanced applied research addresses a specific question in the field of architecture. To tackle these problems, students utilize their expertise to formulate innovative solutions. Each student conducts his/her research independently, with the assistance of a faculty advisor. The research can take many forms including a design proposal, urban investigation, a technology, building system, or a fabrication experiment to name a few. The results of the yearlong research initiative are to be presented in form of an exhibition, installation, book, website, database or other form. With an emerging global society reshaping Architecture’s disciplinary imperatives to address such needs as ecologically sustainable design or the varied demands placed upon architects as they work within and create increasingly complex public spheres, new graduates in architecture must be prepared to navigate a multi-disciplinary profession. Architects not only design, but they must also develop new forms of expertise. Leading the field in innovation and experimentation, the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preserva19
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tion’s research laboratories focus on three key interrelated initiatives: – Development of new technologies and fabrication methods – Cultural analysis of local and global conditions – Investigation of urbanization and its impact AAR places the same emphasis on the research labs that the master degree programs place on the design studios. Students expand the knowledge and skills acquired in completion of the master’s degree in a setting dedicated to applied research. Students devise a two semester advanced architectural research project to investigate specific questions in the field of architecture. Under the supervision of a lab director or faculty member, students utilize their expertise to create innovative design responses to address those problems. All research is experimental in spirit, but nonetheless directed toward how this knowledge can be applied to engage real issues concerning how architecture shapes the world. The curriculum of the program draws on courses already offered within the University, primarily through the Architecture Program, but also in the departments of Planning, Preservation, Art History/Archeology, Anthropology, Visual Arts, Engineering and elsewhere. All students are required to take “Methods in Applied Architectural Research,” an introduction to research methods.
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