Fall 2022 final reviews will take place between November 29 and December 7.
Final reviews are open to all; students and faculty are encouraged to attend as many as possible.
This semester, we look forward to welcoming guest reviewers Akima Brackeen (IIT), Ali Fard (University of Virginia), Alysen Hiller Fiore (REX), Iker Gil (MAS Context / SOM Foundation), Chana Haouzi (IIT, University of Chicago), Jen Park (IIT), MinKeun Park (SOM), Anjulie Rao (journalist and critic), and Jesús Vassallo (Rice University). Their bios appear below.
Tuesday, November 29
Basic/ExtraFirst-year undergraduate studio
Faculty: Kelly Bair (coordinator), Abigail Chang, Ania Jaworska, Andrew Jennings, Meghan Quigley, Juan Suarez, Aura Venckunaite1100, 3100 gallery • 2–6pm
Let’s start with the basic geometries of architecture’s building blocks: columns, beams, walls, and roofs. Next, let’s make it extra.
Thursday, December 1
Chicago FrameSecond-year undergraduate studio
Faculty: Barbara Materia (coordinator), Chris Frye, Palmyra Geraki, Spencer McNeil, Allison Newmeyer, Dan Wheeler1100 • 2–6pm
The Chicago Frame: a speculation about its creative alterations, alternative uses, and possible improvements through the design of the three-dimensional skeleton and typical plan for a multistory building.
Monday, December 5
Cloud FormFourth-year-undergraduate option studioFaculty: Clare Lyster1100 • 9am–12:30pm
An exploration of alternative typologies of cloud-based storage that reshape the countryside and the city and that offer sustainable and artful relationships between information systems, land, resources, and users.
Most AveragestFourth-year-undergraduate option studioFaculty: Paul Preissner3100 gallery • 9am–12:30pm
An investigation of the “most average American house,” starting from a look at the plank house type, built by the Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest and believed to have originated three thousand years ago.
Residential Parking: New Designs on the Open PlanFirst-year graduate studioFaculty: Sarah Blankenbaker1100 • 2–5:30pm
The flexibility and potentially infinite expansion of the open plan is made possible by its fundamental conditions—equal measure and a ground plane.
Basic/Extra selected projectsFirst-year undergraduate studio3100 gallery • 2–5:30pm
Tuesday, December 6
Shall We Play A Game?Fourth-year undergraduate option studioFaculty: Sean Lally4300 octagon • 9am–12:30pm
Video games provide an opportunity for immersive play: a means for “rehearsing” design and social interactions through experience.
RefinementFourth-year undergraduate option studioFaculty: Thomas Kelley1100 • 9am–12:30pm
An exercise in architectural refinement, or the improvement or clarification of something by the making of small changes, to the existing Keck-Gottschalk-Keck Apartments (1937) located at 5551 South University Avenue in Hyde Park, Chicago.
On The House: Three-in-One and One-for-AllSecond-year graduate studioFaculty: Penelope Dean and Grant Gibson3100 octagon, 3100 gallery • 11am–12:30pm, 2–6pm
An exploration of how minimalism in all its multitudes—minimum possessions, minimum space, minimum materials, minimum structures, minimum gardens, and so on—might liberate spatial excesses for collective living.
Chicago Frame selected projectsSecond-year undergraduate studio3100 gallery • 2–5:30pm
Wednesday, December 7
Mirage: The UIC Desert UnitThird-year undergraduate studio1100 • 9am–12:30pm
An architecture school design unit that imagines the possibility of spending the spring semester in the Mojave Desert.
Architecture as RepresentationThird-year graduate studioFaculty: Sam Jacob3100 gallery • 2–5:30pm
An examination of issues of architectural representation: how it represents (drawing), who it represents (politics), and what it represents (discipline).
Guest critic bios
Akima Brackeen is the inaugural Rowe Fellow and Visiting Assistant Professor at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT). Her research challenges the racial perceptions, values, and culture of waterscapes by translating and spatializing Black narratives through music and the built environment. Brackeen received a Master of Architecture from the University of Michigan and a Bachelor of Science in Architecture and Community Design from the University of San Francisco. Brackeen previously worked at David Baker Architects in San Francisco and MASS Design in Kigali, Rwanda.
Ali Fard is a designer, researcher, and educator. His work engages urban systems and spatial imprints of technology across multiple scales.
Alysen Hiller Fiore is a director at REX, where she has been leading the design team for the Ronald O. Perelman Performing Arts Center at the World Trade Center (nearing completion) since its competition in 2014. Prior to joining REX in 2012, Aly worked at Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) in Copenhagen and Zago Architecture in Los Angeles. Aly has recently held an adjunct associate professor position at The Cooper Union in New York City.
Iker Gil is the founder of the design office MAS Studio and the nonprofit MAS Context as well as the executive director of the SOM Foundation.
Chana Haouzi is an architect, educator, and founder of Architecture for Public Benefit.
Jen Park is principal of Brininstool+Lynch and Professor in Practice and Director of Second Year Studios at IIT College of Architecture.
MinKeun Park is a designer at SOM in Chicago.
Anjulie Rao is a journalist and critic covering the built environment. Based in Chicago, much of her work reckons with the complexities of post-industrial cities; explores connections to place and land; and exposes intersections between architecture, landscapes, and cultural change.
Jesús Vassallo is a Spanish architect and writer, and currently an associate professor at Rice University. His work focuses on the problem of realism in architecture through the production of design and scholarship.