T&G YEARBOOK COORDINATORS
Deeksha Ganesh
Natalie Magnuszewski
James Lawn
Cindy Tasong
Sophie Henderson
COVER PAGE DESIGN
Siara Wong
YEAR 1 REPRESENTATIVE
Sophie Henderson
YEAR 1
“The first year is a foundation and qualifying year at the University of Nottingham for both Architecture (B.Arch.) and Architecture and Environmental Design (M.Eng.) students. It is a studio based module within which the fundamental principles of architectural design are taught, tested and developed through a series of design projects.
The studio module is year-long and runs for 25 weeks, with two full days of tutoring per week. The year is divided into five units, each unit having a full-time Unit Leader, assisted by visiting practitioners and Year 6 Masters students.
The students entering Year 1 have very different sets of skills and levels of understanding related to the study of architecture. The foundation year is designed to be a gradual process of learning and development, with each project building on the project before, and being designed to test the students’ skills in each of the key areas of architectural education.
The academic year starts with the ‘Archi-tetes’ Project. Combining the facial features of famous Architects with elements of their buildings style, the ‘Architetes’ project encourages incoming Year 1 and Year 5 students to create an upto-date 3D version of Louis Hellman’s much loved caricatures, for the digital age. The studio programme comprises five stages.
Stage 1 - ‘Foundation One and Two’ - is an initial five weeks of observation, drawing, sketching, model making and skills development, based on short practical exercises, culminating in a six day field study trip to either Amsterdam or Paris.
Stage 2 - ‘Design Integration One’ - applies and tests the skills acquired in ‘Foundation One and Two’ in a five week exercise to design a studio and optimal living working space for an artist or sculptor in the gardens at Chatsworth House in Derbyshire.
Stage 3 -‘Semester One Portfolio Review’ – assess how well the student has progressed in the first semester.
Stage 4 - ‘Design Integration Two’ - is the final project of the year. It is a thirteen week design project that integrates all the knowledge and experience of all the previous stages in the design of a building in the City of Nottingham. Students choose from one of five projects which celebrate the heritage and culture of Nottingham and its surrounding areas.
Stage 5 - ‘Semester Two Portfolio Review’ - assesses how well the students have progressed in the second semester and whether they have acquired the skills needed to pass to the second year of their course.
In addition to learning the fundamental architectural principles of creating a building that responds to the needs of a specific client and a given site, the studio module also places great emphasis on teaching students to communicate their ideas and design intentions clearly and effectively through drawings, models and verbal presentations.
The integration of taught modules within studio plays an important role in Year One, with Environmental Design, Architectural Humanities, Construction, Structures, and Integrated Design in Architecture contributing to and being tested within the studio projects at various points throughout the year.
The projects shown on the following pages display student’s work for Stage 4 – the Comprehensive Design Project – undertaken in the Spring semester.”
YEAR CONTRIBUTORS
YEAR LEADER
Liz Bromley
UNIT TUTORS
Unit 1 – Susie Douglas & Alison Gwynne
Unit 2 – Sinead Hennessy
Unit 3 – Liz Bromley
Unit 4 – Elena Thatcher & Farida Makki
Unit 5 – Ben Youd & Ed Higgins
VISITING PRACTITIONERS
Unit 1 – Chris Goodwin & Adam Brown
Unit 2 – Patrick Mahony & Emily Percival
Unit 3 – Andrew Jowitt & Steph Kyle
Unit 4 – Martin Williams & Thomas McLean
Unit 5 – Andrew King & John Newbery
MASTERS STUDENTS
Unit 1 – Lucy Galloway, Chris Bennett & Josh Taylor
Unit 2 – Owen Davies, Max Hargrave & Georgina Lay
Unit 3 - Lauren Leyva, Harriet Beale & James Campbell
Unit 4 - Matt Urry, Caty Goulbourn & Eric Atkinson
Unit 5 - Abbey Dean, Jenny Wilson & John Holroyd
EXTERNAL REVIEWERS
Alison Davies
Matt Strong
Margaret Mulcahy
ARCHI-TÊTES
Inspired by Louis Hellman’s ‘ARCHI-TÊTES’ caricatures, Farida Makki created the ‘Architetes’ project for the Year 1 BArch and MEng students in 2018. When all in person events were forced online due to the pandemic in 2020, we looked to Farida’s ‘Archi-tetes’ project as an ideal replacement for the long running Tour de Pasenville as the University of Nottingham’s induction project for the Department of Architecture.
Combining the facial features of famous Architects with elements of their buildings style, the ‘Archi-tetes’ project encourages incoming Year 1 and 5 students to create an up-to-date 3D version of the much loved caricartures, for the digital age.
The two-day project, ably led by the Year 6 team leaders, has taken a step out of the student’s bedrooms this year and back into the studios. With students now able to attend in person, each team showed off their creations in a fashion style catwalk, to students and staff from the department.
Some 20 years since Helman’s book Architêtes: the id in the Grid (2000) was published, we are viewing this project as an evolution of his ‘ARCHI-TÊTES’ and taking them online and in 3D for a digital age!
