Lecturer Vinayak Bharne has released a new book titled The Emerging Asian City: Concomitant Urbanities & Urbanisms (Routledge), a 24-chapter edited anthology on the phenomemon of urban Asia. His other book Rediscovering the Hindu Temple: The Sacred Architecture & Urbanism of India (Cambridge Scholars Publishing) is also due for release early January 2013. In his practice as Director of Design at Moule & Polyzoides, the boulevard transformation in the City of Lancaster’s (CA) downtown was recognized with the National Award for Smart Growth Achievement – Overall Excellence, the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s highest honor.

Assistant Professor Alvin Huang, AIA and his firm Synthesis Design + Architecture are amongst 1 of 5 teams shortlisted out of 166 submissions for a public art installation at Space Port America in New Mexico.  SDA was also recently named to the Rami George Holland Year End Review 2012: 30 Cultural Pioneers by the year 2030, and placed 5th in the Chengdu Wuzhou International Plaza design competition.  Additionally, Alvin has also been named the 2013 Taylor Seminar Visiting Scholar at the University of Calgary Faculty of Environmental Design.  In February 2013, Alvin will lead a 1 week design/build workshop focused on form-finding, material performance and digital fabrication which will culminate in a full-scale installation, lecture, and exhibition of recent work. 

Lawrence Scarpa, FAIA, was a visiting professor at Harvard Graduate School of Design in the Fall 2012 Semester.  His firm Brooks + Scarpa received a NextLA AIA Honor Award, the firm’s 68th AIA Award. They were also shortlisted for the new $390 million, 550,000 sq. ft. Los Angeles Federal Courthouse and the $80 million Federal Courthouse located in Mobile, Alabama.

In December Assistant Professor Kenneth Breisch presented the paper, “Rediscovering the Fachwerk House in America: Preservation, the Bechers and Modernism” at the symposium “Typologie und Kontext” at the University of Siegen, Germany.  He gave a keynote lecture in November at the symposium, “Glessner House at 125,” in Chicago.  Breisch is also serving as the General Chair for the Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians to be held in Buffalo in April 2013.

Jennifer Siegal will be featured in the upcoming Swedish documentary Off the Grid. Her work will be published in the revised edition of Robert Kronenburg ‘s Architecture in Motion: The History and Development of the Portable Building by Routledge, Oxford and Salvage Secrets published by W.W. Norton and Co.

Lecturer Scott Uriu‘s work has been published in the book Panel Layout – Competition a 3 volume book featuring 267 competition projects from 72 designers from around the world.   Scott Uriu’s firm B+U’s NTCArt museum in Taiwan and Performing Arts Center for Iserlohn Germany are featured in the book.  In March Form Magazine features the Performing Arts Center in Iserlohn, Germany. 

With the addition of a high resolution laser and camera scanner Alexander Robinson continues to expand and develop the technological capabilities of his Landscape Morphologies Lab This technology will allow for the realtime analysis and projection of forms generated with the lab’s robotic modeling of landscapes with sand and other mediums. 

Peter Simmonds was in Shenzhen, China with Thom Mayne of Morphosis presenting the Morphosis design for the Hanking Tower Competition which they won, beating some serious competition for this 360m high tower. Simmonds also presented at the faculty Pecca Kucha offering an Engineering perspective of Architecture. He also gave a seminar on designing comfortable spaces at the Southern California ASHRAE technical seminar in Downey.

Adjunct Professor Veronica G. Galen successfully passed the Lighting Certificate exam and was the lighting designer for various projects that received awards from the AIA/California Council. She has also accepted a position as Secretary of the Illuminating Engineering Society, Los Angeles Chapter (IESLA).

Ed Woll (Tomko Woll Group Architects Inc) has attended openings for three recently-completed residential developments in the past two months:  Young Burlington apartments near Koreaown, Joveness Houses in East LA and Jill’s Place (permanent supportive housing for formerly homeless women in downtown LA.)  These projects were done in collaboration with USCArch alumna Ena Dubnoff.  In the works are renovation of an existing pool and parking garage for a condominium complex in West LA’s “Million Dollar Mile” and a new housing development for seniors and homeless veterans in Eagle Rock.

Diane Ghirardo‘s new book, Italy. Modern Architectures in Context, has just been published by Reaktion Press in London and Chicago.

Erik Mar recently completed the 7200 sf East Rancho Dominguez Library, in Compton, CA. It is the first LEED Platinum rated building owned and operated by the County of Los Angeles.

John Frane, partner in the firm Predock_Frane, was in Washington DC in December to jury the 2013 Progressive Architecture Awards which will be announced after the first of the year. Earlier this year he was a juror for the Tampa chapter of the AIA 2012 Design Awards with fellow USC faculty Alice Kimm and Larry Scarpa. Earlier this year Predock_Frane participated in the ‘100 YC’ Exhibition at the 2012 Venice Biennale in Venice Italy. Their project, titled ‘Faces of Maribor’ re-conceptualized the historic core of the city of Maribor  Slovenia, speculating on the issues of urban evolution and challenging traditional notions of history and memory as definers of our collective urban fabric. In the spring they collaborated with the contemporary dance duo Casebolt & Smith to design the sets for their world renowned performance piece O(h)! 2012 also marked the start of two significant new cultural project, an expansion of a buddhist monastery in New Mexico and a new art exhibition space in the Hollywood arts district.

Tom Marble’s work has appeared in The Architect’s Newspaper, MONU Magazine, LA Times Magazine, and Metropolis; his After the city, this (is how we live) was published by the LA Forum for Architecture & Urban Design in 2008; he led an urban design studio Urban Successionism in Colorado Springs, at Colorado College Spring 2012; and he is at work on The Expediter, a noir tale of urban love and betrayal soon to be completed.

Steven Ehrlich, FAIA, RIBA was named #35 in Middle East Architect Magazines’ 50 most influential people on regional architecture. The list recognizes principals, figureheads, association heads and academics, in addition to designers of landmark buildings, known throughout the globe.