The studio focused on the interdependent relationship between the massing of a project and its smallest component, the unit. It also focused on the notion of ‘context’ or ‘specific condition of place’ and the role it plays in an architectural design process. In both projects, precedents were proposed for their relevance to the exercises and students were asked to analyze the essence of these projects and reinvest their fundamental principles into the design process.

01 Field of Walls
6-weeks
Stemming from the assumption that there can still be a city where all can inhabit, share, and use, each student is assigned a plot in a virtual piazza to project a living and working space for a community. While one dwelling is developed, we questioned the relationship between one and the whole to enable a “community living”. What other ways of dwelling are there? What sort of administrative system is possible? What system of mutual-aid can we develop? Students started by analyzing projects and drawings by architect Peter Eisenman.

02 External Stimuli
8-weeks
In the second project, students investigated existing typologies in Hay el Selloum (Achrafieh) as a mean to better understand the context and propose a project based on a module that is repeated 6 times to create a system. The integration of the project on the specific site called for a readjustment of the unit design. Taking the room as the first element of a project for living space allowed us to see the question of housing on completely different terms re-discussing and challenging the idea of what is public and what is private. The system was based on the analysis of various precedents.