Architectural Education Symposium: The Unit System

Lecture date: 2004-11-02

Given the widespread acceptance of the AAs unit system, does it still provide an imaginative and successful form of educational arrangement? What contemporary changes or reforms could be made?

Robert Mull graduated from the AA in 1983 and was an AA Unit Master from 1986-1998. He is head of the Department of Architecture and Spatial Design at London Metropolitan University.

Carlos Villanueva Brandt studied at the AA from 1977-1982 and has taught as an AA Unit Master since 1986.

Brett Steele directs the DRL at the AA. He is a partner at D[A]L in London.

Tony Fretton was an AA Unit Master in the 1980s and 1990s.

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Architectural Education Symposium: Accreditation

Lecture date: 2004-11-03

How does the current debate about accreditation affect the AA? How can the issue of the AA’s independence be related to the necessity for accreditation and validation within the school?

Simon Allford is an architect and partner in Allford Hall Monaghan Morris, whose work encompasses a wide range of projects for arts, education, health, transport, leisure and living. He has been Tutor and Unit Master at the Bartlett and is now Visiting Professor. He is trustee and advisor to a number of charities and industry bodies as well as schools of architecture - including the AA where he is Treasurer. He is currently Chairman of the RIBA President’s Medals.With Mark Cousins

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Architectural Education Symposium: The Happy Volcano

Lecture date: 2004-11-03

Peter Cook on The Happy Volcano: A Description of the Ideal Architecture School Invented by Way of Projects, Anecdotes, Strategies, Family Trees, Kites and Myths.

Peter Cook graduated from the AA in 1960 and taught there from 1964 to 1990. He became Professor of Architecture at the Stadelschule in Frankfurt in 1984 and was Chairman of the Bartlett from 1990 to 2004. He was awarded both the Royal Gold Medal of the RIBA (as member of Archigram) and the RIBA Annie Spink Medal for teaching in 2002.

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Architectural Education Symposium: Pedagogies of Architecture . . .

Lecture date: 2004-11-04

Pedagogies of Architecture Beyond the Beaux-Arts: Theories, Methods, Structures and Forms. The first school of architecture was the Royal Academy of Architecture in France. Its focus was on the theoretical; its learning methods via discussion of specific problems and critical discourse. The architecture programme was reopened after the French Revolution as the Ecole des Beaux-Arts - counterpart to the newly formed Ecole Polytechnique, which taught architecture to engineers. The two schools were complicit in dividing architectural knowledge into art and science: let us discover how this is to be reformatted in the twenty-first century.

Nasrine Seraji-Bozorgzad studied at the AA before founding her own studio in Paris. She has recently completed housing projects in Paris and Vienna. She has taught at the AA, Columbia and Princeton Universities, and is Professor and Chair of the Architecture Department at Cornell University.

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Architectural Education Symposium: Graduate Education

Lecture date: 2004-11-04
FIORI, Jorge/Robert MAXWELL/Brett STEELE

What are the long-term consequences of the growth of graduate education at the AA? How can the Graduate and Undergraduate Schools be better integrated?

Jorge Fiori is a sociologist specialising in housing and urban development. He teaches in the Graduate School Housing and Urbanism programme at the AA.

Robert Maxwell began practicing as an architect in 1950 and joined the staff of the AA in 1958. Between 1962 and 1982 he taught at the Bartlett. In 1982 he was appointed Dean of Architecture at Princeton University and is now an Emeritus Professor of Architecture. He teaches in the Graduate School Histories & Theories programme at the AA. Brett Steele directs the DRL at the AA. He is a partner at D[A]L in London.

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Architectural Education Symposium: Closing Lecture

Lecture date: 2004-11-05

Zaha Hadid studied at the AA from 1972 and was awarded the Diploma Prize in 1977. She joined OMA in the same year and started teaching in Dip 9 with her former tutors Rem Koolhaas and Elia Zenghelis, before leading her own unit until 1987. More recently, she held the Kenzo Tange Chair at the Graduate School of Design, Harvard; the Sullivan Chair of the University of Illinois; and is Professor at the University of Applied Arts, Vienna. She has also held several guest professorships. Best known for her seminal built works, her central concerns involve a simultaneous engagement in practice, teaching and research. Experimenting with new spatial concepts that intensify existing urban landscapes in the pursuit of a visionary aesthetic that encompasses all fields and scales of design, her work has been both widely published and the subject of several major exhibitions.

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A book launch of architect, verb The New Language of Building by Reinier de Graaf

Leading architect Reinier de Graaf punctures the myths behind the debates on contemporary architecture with wit and devastating honesty. Architecture, it seems, has become too important to leave to architects. No longer does it suffice to judge a building solely by its look and feel, it must be measured and certified. What remains of a discipline once it is reduced to ticking boxes of ‘excellence', 'sustainability', 'well-being', 'liveability', 'placemaking', 'creativity', 'beauty' and 'innovation'?

In architect, verb., De Graaf dryly skewers the doublespeak and hot air of an industry in search of an identity in the 21st century. Who determines how to measure a ‘green building’? Why is Vancouver more 'liveable' than Vienna? How do developers get away with advertising their buildings as promoting 'well-being'? Why did Silicon Valley become so obsessed with devising 'creative' spaces or developing code that replaces architects? How much revenue can be attributed to the design of public space? Who gets to set these criteria, and what do they actually mean for the future of our homes, cities, planet?

Purchase the book here: https://aabookshop.net/?wpsc-product=architect-verb

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