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Creating a Reading List for Architecture Students

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Barbara Opar and Barret Havens, column editors
Column written by Rose Orcutt, Architecture Librarian, University of Buffalo

 

At the University at Buffalo, undergraduates and graduate students in the School of Architecture & Planning often inquire about “reading lists” that can provide an introduction/overview to various theories, typologies, and architectural influences covered in their classes.

I consulted with seven of my architecture faculty, including the Dean of Architecture, and from them I received a number of responses and suggestions, including reading lists from Princeton and Yale. This exchange developed into discussions on the demand for other architecture related reading lists. Based on popular assignments and students’ research interests, we are creating lists on the history of Buffalo and Western New York, gender/identity in architecture, a faculty publication list, and a UB architecture and planning research centers’ reading list.

The first list compiled is made up of resources considered to be  the ‘classics’ in architecture based on the Princeton, Yale, and UB architecture faculty suggestions.  This list is not a static document, but updated routinely though my Blog at http://libweb.lib.buffalo.edu/blog/architecture/?page_id=1188 . Resources are arranged by years published, rather than topics, because the subjects are too varied, thus making the list unmanageable. The American Planning Association has a similar list (arranged by decades) for their top 100 essential planning books at http://planning.org/centennial/greatbooks/ .  A Pinterest page http://www.pinterest.com/ublibraries/architecture-reading-list/, developed by a library school graduate student, also highlights the classic resources. Both the Pinterest site and the blog provide direct links to the UB Library catalog record, so students can quickly refer to the resource.

 

2000s:

Allen, S., & Agrest, D. (2000). Practice: architecture, technique, and representation. Australia: G+B Arts International.

Balmond, C., Smith, J., & Brensing, C. (2002). Informal. Munich ; New York: Prestel.

Bergdoll, B. (2000). European architecture 1750-1890. New York: Oxford University Press.

Colquhoun, A. (2002). Modern architecture. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 

Eisenman, P. (2004). Eisenman inside out: Selected writings, 1963-1988. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Foreign Office Architects., & Institute of Contemporary Arts (London, E. (2003). Phylogenesis: Foa’s ark. Barcelona: Actar.

Forty, A. (2000). Words and buildings: A vocabulary of modern architecture. New York, N.Y.: Thames & Hudson.

LeGates, R. T., & Stout, F. (2003). The city reader. London: New York.

Reiser, J., & Umemoto, N. (2006). Atlas of novel tectonics. New York: Princeton Architectural Press. 

Smithson, A. M., & Smithson, P. (2001). The charged void–architecture. New York: Monacelli Press.

1990s:

Allen, S. (1999). Points + lines: Diagrams and projects for the city. New York: Princeton Architectural Press.

Blaser, W. (1997). Mies van der Rohe. Basel ; Boston: Birkhauser Verlag.

Boyer, M. C. (1996). The city of collective memory: Its historical imagery and architectural entertainments. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Corner, J. (1999). Recovering landscape: Essays in contemporary landscape architecture. New York: Princeton Architectural Press.

Eisenman, P. (1999). Diagram diaries. New York: Universe.

Evans, R. (1997). Translations from drawing to building and other essays. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Hays, K. M. (1998). Architecture theory since 1968. Cambridge, Mass: The MIT Press.

Hays, K. M. (1998). Oppositions reader: Selected readings from a journal for ideas and criticism in architecture, 1973-1984. New York: Princeton Architectural Press.

Jackson, J. B. (1994). A sense of place, a sense of time. New Haven: Yale University Press.

Koolhaas, R. (1994). Delirious New York: A retroactive manifesto for Manhattan. New York: Monacelli Press.

Koolhaas, R., Mau, B., Sigler, J., Werlemann, H., & Office for Metropolitan Architecture. (1998). Small, medium, large, extra-large: Office for Metropolitan Architecture, Rem Koolhaas, and Bruce Mau. New York, N.Y.: Monacelli Press. 

Lynn, G. (1998). Folds, bodies & blobs : collected essays. [Bruxelles]: La Lettre volée.

Schneider, U., Feustel, M., Suermondt-Ludwig-Museum Aachen., & Kunstcentrum deSingel (Antwerp, B. (1999). Toyo Ito: Blurring architecture. Milan: Charta.

Venturi, R., Museum of Modern Art (New York, N., & Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts. (1990). Complexity and contradiction in architecture. New York : New York: Museum of Modern Art in association with the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Chicago.

1980s:

Banham, R. (1980). Theory and design in the first machine age. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Foster, H. (1983). The Anti-aesthetic: Essays on postmodern culture. Port Townsend, Wash.: Bay Press.

Kern, S. (1983). The culture of time and space 1880-1918. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.

Krauss, R. E. (1985). The originality of the avant-garde and other modernist myths. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. 

Libeskind, D. (1981). Between zero and infinity: Selected projects in architecture. New York, NY: Rizzoli International Publications.

Le Corbusier. (1986). Towards a new architecture. New York: Dover Publications.

Lynch, K. (1984). Good city form. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Rossi, A., & Eisenman, P. (1982). The architecture of the city. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Rowe, C. (1982). The mathematics of the ideal villa, and other essays. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Salvadori, M., Hooker, S., & Ragus, C. (1980). Why buildings stand up: The strength of architecture. New York: Norton.

1970s:
Conrads, U. (1971). Programs and manifestoes on 20th-century architecture. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

Tafuri, M. (1979). Architecture and utopia: Design and capitalist development. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.


1960s:

Banham, R. (1969). The architecture of the well-tempered environment. [Chicago]: University of Chicago Press.

Giedion, S. (. (1967). Space, time and architecture: The growth of a new tradition. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Le Corbusier, Boesiger, W., & Girsberger, H. (1967). Le Corbusier, 1910-65. New York: Praeger.


1940s:

Giedion, S. (., & Library of Robert Duncan (State University of New York at Buffalo). (1948). Mechanization takes command, a contribution to anonymous history. New York: Oxford University Press.

ÒOnce IÕm an Internationally-Renowned Architect, When Am I Ever Going to Use This Stuff?": Architectural Information Literacy Instruction Based on Real World Problems

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Barbara Opar and Barret Havens, column editors
Article submitted by Barret Havens, Assistant Professor and Outreach Librarian, Woodbury University

 

As an architecture librarian I know that the research concepts and techniques that we convey to students are crucial to their success. However, teaching can still be a tough sell for many of us. As members of the Google generation, many students have trouble understanding why the resources they need are only obtainable through a multi-step process and why many of those resources are available solely in print. This makes teaching the architecture-specific information literacy course that I teach at Woodbury University a challenge. In addition to being entertaining enough to keep students who have just pulled all-nighters in the studio from sleeping with their eyes open–an art which architecture students seem to have mastered—I must relate each and every exercise and assignment to the design process in order to stave off, by answering continually, the question that students often ponder in their non-studio courses: “once I’m an internationally-renowned architect, when am I ever going to use this stuff?”

My approach to resolving this conundrum has been to present information as the foundation and inspiration for design. Along those lines, two semesters ago, I began structuring my course around the same issue that triggers the need for design: a real-world problem. Throughout the semester, students seek out, evaluate, and compile information resources in a variety of formats that revolve around the challenge of designing the most effective temporary shelter for those who may be displaced by coastal climate change or natural disasters. We take an interdisciplinary approach to this. To design an effective shelter, in addition to relevant architectural precedents, students would need to consider the climate of the site and a variety of perspectives about the people who would inhabit the shelters such as their eating habits, typical family size, medical needs, etc. Since I implemented this approach, the pass rate for my class (and Woodbury dictates that students must get a “C” in order to pass) has risen by 24% and course evaluations reflect students’ appreciation of a problem-based curriculum.  Class discussions throughout the semester have been more lively as well, and this overarching theme gives the course cohesion and helps students to place where they are in the process and to recall how they arrived there.

However, the work that my students have been doing, though it has been focused on a problem that deserves attention, is artificial in the sense that no one will actually use the information that the students organize into annotated bibliographies to build a structure of any kind. It will never gain a wider audience than me, their professor. Next fall, I hope to change that by combining forces with Jeanine Centuori, the founder of Woodbury University’s Architecture + Civic Engagement (ACE) Center. Recently, Woodbury students, in conjunction with ACE, designed and built a variety of structures at Taking the Reins, a local organization that offers urban farming and equestrian programs for girls “facing the challenge of adolescence in high-risk environments” and also at Shadow Hills Equestrian Center, which offers a therapeutic horsemanship program.

ACE is currently exploring the possibility of designing and building a streetscape in inner-city Los Angeles that would unify a neighborhood and draw residents into public spaces. If the timing works out, I will have my students join the effort by compiling a comprehensive list of sources that will inform the streetscape design process by offering perspectives on the history and politics of the neighborhood, as well as case-studies of similar projects. It is my hope that my students will be inspired by the fact that their work will be integrated into a process that will make a tangible difference in a local community. I will let you know how it goes!

Have you integrated real-world problems into your teaching, whether in credit-bearing courses or “one-shot” instruction? If so, please share!

ACSA Attendees: Welcome to Sunny Miami from the Association of Architecture School Librarians

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Barbara Opar and Barret Havens, column editors

Coming to Miami for ACSA?  AASL members would like to invite you to join us -as your time permits. Here are some sessions that may be of interest to you as architectural educators:

 

Friday, April 11

3:45-5:15 Lightning Rounds

Library as Client
John Schinkle from Roger Williams University talks about his experiences working as a client with students in a course on digital manufacturing. In addition to showing the initial designs for a system to display student work in the Library, John talks about the successes and failures of both the process and the chosen design.

New Uses for GIS
Want to know more about new ways of using GIS software?  University of Florida and Florida International University staff are engaged in two grant-funded projects using GIS and digital technologies to document the histories of St. Augustine and Coral Gables.

Acquisitions and New Media
Want to hear about what we need to do in order to acquire new kinds of resources?  Martha Walker from Cornell describes the challenges of ordering a 3-D map.

The Visual Thinker
Jesse Vestermark from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo discusses his use of drawing software to illustrate library concepts.

Tumblr and the Library Collection
Tumblr is being used at the Indianapolis Museum of Art to promote the collections.

 

Saturday, April 12

9:15-11:15 Materials Collections in Libraries- A Panel Discussion
Join Mark Pompelia from RISD as he chairs a discussion about materials collections in libraries.  Different approaches to acquiring and organizing physical materials samples will be presented along with comments from participants on their experiences with such media. Fiona Anastas from Material Connexion is among the presenters.

11:30-1:00 The Post Digital Library
AASL will also take up the issue of the library in the post-digital era. Chaired by Hannah Bennett from Princeton University, a panel of members will pick up where the ACSA’s conference theme, “Globalizing Architecture: Flows and Disruptions” leaves off. The panel will address how traditional roles and services have changed to accommodate new developments in the design school or firm, be it through global practice, technological advances, curricular reshaping, or the ever-morphing interdisciplinarity of design.

 

 

Making it Relevant to Them: An Architecture-specific Information Literacy Course

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Barret Havens, Woodbury University Outreach and Architecture Subject Librarian

 

Thinking critically about information and using information ethically___–core tenets of the field of information literacy–have become more relevant than ever to the architecture curriculum.  This is due in part to the fact that architecture students seeking information to incorporate into research papers and precedent studies tend to rely heavily upon free, often less-than-authoritative sources located through Google or other search engines. In a recent study of the information-seeking behaviors of architecture students, Makri and Warwich noted that even at the graduate level, students  made “almost no use of dedicated electronic architectural resources…despite many resources being listed by subject on the university library catalogue” (1752). In addition, “despite the ubiquity of images on the internet…” students in humanities and related disciplines, even if they have been taught to think critically about textual information, are “confounded when confronted with an image if they have not been taught how to analyze images” (Martinez 10).

The ethical use of information is an especially crucial issue for students in design-related disciplines because they are often confused about what constitutes plagiarism since the imitation of established architects, artists, and designers has long been promoted by instructors as an essential learning tool (Walker 49). Students in architecture and design disciplines might also be tempted to plagiarize as a quick and easy solution when they find themselves short on time after marathon sessions in studio (49).

Recognizing the importance of information literacy to all disciplines including architecture, Woodbury University, a small, private college with campuses in Burbank and San Diego, requires that each student, prior to graduation, complete a ten-week information literacy course taught by a member of the library science faculty. Before the fall semester of 2011, most architecture students at the Burbank campus fulfilled this requirement by completing a general information literacy course (LSCI 105) that offered them little opportunity to apply information literacy skills within the context of their major. In order to increase the perceived relevance of information literacy to architecture students’ discipline and to help them conceptualize the vital role of information in the design process, a new course was implemented: “LSCI 106: Information Sources in Architecture and Interior Architecture.”

The course is structured around specific information needs at both the academic and professional level including researching: architectural precedents, site planning, building systems, codes and standards, design materials, construction methods, and locating architectural images. In addition, information literacy skills relevant to all disciplines are explored. These include citing sources and avoiding plagiarism, establishing the reliability of sources, developing well-focused thesis statements, and Boolean searching and other advanced database search strategies.

Whenever possible, the same hands-on, process-oriented approach pervasive throughout the Woodbury School of Architecture curriculum is employed in LSCI 106. For instance, during the first week of the course, students are asked to create diagrams representing the steps in the research process. They are then asked to reflect on whether a linear, sequential representation is adequate or whether another model, such as a three-dimensional representation would be more appropriate. In another example, students are asked to design their own user-friendly bibliographic citation style. Instruction takes place in the library computer lab and students spend approximately 65% of class time actively searching for, or evaluating information sources.

Another theme that figures prominently into the course is problem-based learning. For each module of the course, teams of students are given professional practice scenarios that require them to locate sources of information that resolve challenges they might encounter as practicing architects. For instance, rather than being asked simply to “use the MaterialConnexion database to find textile-based architecture materials,” they are presented with a complex scenario such as “a client has asked you to design an elementary school library in a desert climate in Arizona. Please use the MaterialConnexion database to locate textile-based materials that would be ideal for the interior of a library in this climate and for this particular group of users.” Furthermore, students are asked to reflect on statements by Woodbury University School of Architecture faculty about how information informs and inspires their professional practice (these statements were solicited from them by the author). These exercises raise students’ awareness of the relevance of critical thinking and information to their discipline.

Overall, architecture students who take LSCI 106 have exhibited higher levels of engagement and attendance than architecture students who satisfy the Woodbury University information literacy requirement by taking LSCI 105. Since the implementation of LSCI 106 in the fall of 2011, Woodbury librarians have noted, during consultations at the reference desk, a sharp incline in the number of students who indicate some familiarity with the library’s architecture resources. Furthermore, during those consultations, far more students indicate that they have tried using one or two of the library’s architecture resources before asking for assistance. Though preliminary indications suggest that this architecture-specific approach to teaching a credit-bearing information literacy course has achieved some success, further assessment is currently being conducted that might establish this definitively. For instance, several semesters’ worth of scores from rubrics applied to LSCI 106 students’ final annotated bibliography projects will be compared with the scores of architecture students who took LSCI 105 to see if there is a statistically significant difference in performance. Another assessment project is currently underway in which a rubric is being applied to research bibliographies that were submitted by students in major sequence architecture courses. Rubric scores for those students who have successfully completed LSCI 106 will then be compared to those of students who have not completed LSCI 106 in order to explore a possible correlation between completion of the course and demonstrated mastery of information literacy outcomes.

References

Makri, Stephann, and Claire Warwich.“Information for Inspiration: Understanding Architects’ Information Seeking and Use Behaviors to Inform Design.”Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology. 61.9 (2010): 1745-1770. Print.

Martinez, Katharine. “Image Research and Use in the Humanities: An Idiosyncratic Bibliographic Essay.” Art Documentation. 28.1 (2009): 9-15. Print.

Walker, Beth. “New Twists on an Old Problem: Preventing Plagiarism and Academic Integrity in an Art and Design School.” Art Documentation. 28.1 (2009): 48-51. Print.

 

Making architecture theses and thesis prep. work available through an open access tool: the Syracuse experience

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Barbara Opar, column editor

Open Access Week this year is October 22-26. As we approach the sixth year of this program, I can personally attest to the growth of this initiative at my own institution. Peggy Johnson writes in the second edition of Fundamentals of collection development and management states: Libraries are in the knowledge business, with core functions to select and acquire resources, facilitate their discovery, support their access and dissemination, archive and preserve them, and support their community of users as they do their work. Changes in the process of information dissemination have obvious effects in all these areas. The results of research are being perceived as both a public good and a common good as the Internet makes a tremendous amount of research and scholarship freely available and discoverable (p.304). To this end, the Syracuse University Library began an institutional repository in 2009 to make freely available Syracuse University scholarship. Discussions about such a repository had taken place several years earlier at the University level, but it was the Library who saw this initiative through to fruition. Working with BEPRESS, the Library set up a system of collections for each academic unit. When appropriate, series were created within the collections (such as a heading for newsletters).

Individual faculty members were approached to submit articles and book chapters to the repository. Publication guidelines and copyright were carefully reviewed before posting. If a journal did not appear in Sherpa/Romeo as green or was not listed, then the Library turned to a more direct approach, reviewing the actual journal guidelines and/or contacting the editor directly. In this way, the repository began to grow. This is still an important aspect of SUrface, as our repository is known. Incoming students can now read articles by faculty members or learn about the history of the department through sources like digitized lectures.

But Syracuse has, as well, collected undergraduate theses and thesis preparatory booklets. While most institutions collect graduate work, Syracuse has also maintained a collection of undergraduate thesis work. At one point, all such work was collected. But, as students often turn to past years’ examples for study, it was decided to retain only B+ and above theses and thesis prep. books so that students would  browse only “good”  work for  models.  These theses were barcoded and accessible through the Library’s reserve module. Items could be searched by author and title but not readily by keyword. The collection was also difficult to maintain due to high use and varying bindings and formats.

With our institutional repository well established, thesis work seemed a natural addition to SUrface. The department had previously followed the generally accepted practice of making print copies of exit projects submitted in partial fulfillment of a degree available for public reference. So this policy was adapted for the digital copies.

New categories had to be set up in SUrface to accommodate undergraduate work. Digitization standards were put in place to allow for the material to be loaded and viewed. Digital copies had to be reviewed for completeness and clarity. Information, such as the degree, date and the student’s complete name, was verified by the recorder when necessary. Abstracts were created when they were not part of the original document.

For the past two semesters, students have submitted digital copies of their work and the department has made that information available to us. However, many of these files have been very large so they have needed to be optimized, reduced or, in some instances, broken down into several parts.

After countless hours of hard work and persistence by a group of dedicated students, most of the theses and thesis prep. booklets have been uploaded to SUrface. Not surprisingly, these materials are being used. There are currently a total of 267 masters theses, senior theses and thesis prep. books on SUrface. Reports (over the course of about 9 months) indicate a total of 2,064 downloads.

More work remains. We do not have all the theses or thesis prep. books that meet the established criteria and plan to look to faculty help in securing as many of these as possible.

We also plan to ask that next year’s students submit files read to upload and suggest appropriate keywords.

Although more work remains, the project has resulted in improved access, increased visability, and more room for other library material!

Submitted by Barbara Opar with special thanks to Yuan Li,  SUrface administrator, and to Carrie Leneweaver, Christina Hoover and Linsay Royer for all their hard work in completing this project.

Open Access week

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Association of Architecture School Librarians
by Barbara Opar, AASL column editor and Architecture librarian at Syracuse University

Libraries across the country celebrate Open Access week in October. This year’s dates are  October  24th through the 28th.

Open Access Week is an international event now in its fourth year. The events planned by many libraries offer opportunities for the academic and research community to continue to learn about the potential benefits of Open Access, which provides a new way to disseminate scholarship and research.

Open Access makes free, immediate and online access to the results of scholarly research. Open access content can be used and re-used and can transform the way research and scientific inquiry is conducted. It offers immediate benefits for academic institutions. For the academic community, Open Access (OA) can maximize the impact of research by providing wider exposure. Researchers can more easily find information and can then build upon what has been has been done, thus enhancing scholarship. The number of research funding agencies, academic institutions and individual researchers, teachers and members of the general public supporting a move towards Open Access is increasing every year.

Here are a few peer reviewed Open Access journals that you may not have seen:

Architectural Roofing & Waterproofing: http://www.arwmag.com/
Art Design and Communication in Higher Education: http://www.intellectbooks.co.uk/journals/view-Journal,id=139/
Crossings: Electronic Journal of Art and Technology: http://crossings.tcd.ie/
Interior Design: http://www.interiordesign.net/
Opolis: An International Journal of Suburban and Metropolitan Studies:  http://escholarship.org/uc/cssd_opolis
Plumbing and Mechanical: http://www.pmmag.com/
Residential Architect Online: http://www.residentialarchitect.com/default.aspx
Residential Design and Build: http://www.rdbmagazine.com/
SitePrep: http://www.siteprepmag.com/
Stone World: http://www.stoneworld.com/
Tile: http://www.tilemagonline.com/
Wood Digest: http://woodiq.com/default.aspx

AASL Column, January 2012

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Column written by Martha Walker, Architecture Librarian and Coordinator of Collections

Fine Arts Library,  Cornell University.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 If we encounter a man of great intellect, we should ask him what books he reads.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Well, in a sense we did!  Sometimes it is necessary to move a library – its collections, services and staff. Since the summer of 2010, the Fine Arts Library (FAL) at Cornell University has been on the move. Along the way, we learned some interesting  things about our collections and their use.

For a number of very good reasons, the collection (of roughly 140,000 volumes) and the library’s service points and staff have moved to an adjacent facility, Rand Hall. For more information about the move and plans for the FAL, please refer to the September 2010 issue AAP news (online at:  http://aap.cornell.edu/news/newsitem.cfm?customel_datapageid_2892=420927 )

In order to fit into our temporary location, it was necessary to shift 78,000 volumes to Cornell’s Library Annex (which ships user- selected items back to the central campus on a daily basis). Choosing which 78,000 volumes to shift was made easier by the availability of computer generated use reports. That is, we ran a query on the FAL’s circulation data to determine which titles were lower use, with the hope that these items would be those least missed by most users. We quickly learned that we were able to further refine our search by subject classification — in our case, the art, architecture and planning sections of the collection. Eventually, staff curiosity led to a query on the most frequently circulated titles in architecture (the “NA” section of the collection).

It did not take long for news of this query to attract interest, and by November of 2010, a (heavily securitized) exhibit of our most frequently circulated titles was mounted in AAP’s Hartell Gallery. The success of the exhibit, and the interest it generated, was a surprise to all library staff. I shared this experience with my AASL colleagues in Montreal last spring, and was encouraged to publish our list of the most frequently circulated NA titles. A few caveats, the list I’ve included below is limited to 2005 – 2010 data, and it does not include “browse” statistics (titles looked at but not charged from the library). Finally, some titles have duplicate holdings. Therefore one title, i.e. Delirious, New York may show up lower or twice on the list; or, in the case of Small, Medium, Large, X-Large, our reserve copy simply fell to pieces. Its replacement received a new item record and a non-cumulative count. Therefore, here are our top twenty circulating titles (with consideration for these and perhaps other data anomalies) and their number of historical charges between 2005 and 2010:

TitleU

HistChg

Details of modern architecture / Edward R. Ford.

349

Archetypes in architecture / Thomas Thiis-Evensen ; [translated by Ruth Waaler and Scott Campbell].

341

Town and square, from the agora to the village green.

330

Mathematics of the ideal villa, and other essays / Colin Rowe.

273

Collage city / Colin Rowe & Fred Koetter.

267

Delirious New York : a retroactive manifesto for Manhattan / Rem Koolhaas.

260

Delirious New York : a retroactive manifesto for Manhattan / Rem Koolhaas.

252

Design of cities / Edmund N. Bacon.

235

Town and square, from the agora to the village green.

234

Cornell journal of architecture.

233

Small, medium, large, extra-large : Office for Metropolitan Architecture, Rem Koolhaas, and Bruce Mau / edited by Jennifer Sigler ; photography by Hans Werlemann.

209

Cornell journal of architecture.

208

Villa Savoye, Poissy, France, 1929-31 / Le Corbusier [i.e. C. Jeanneret-Gris ; edited and photographed by Yukio Futagawa ; text by Richard Meier.

206

Small, medium, large, extra-large : Office for Metropolitan Architecture, Rem Koolhaas, and Bruce Mau / edited by Jennifer Sigler ; photography by Hans Werlemann.

202

Details of modern architecture / Edward R. Ford.

187

Theories and manifestoes of contemporary architecture / edited by Charles Jencks and Karl Kropf.

178

Finding lost space : theories of urban design / Roger Trancik.

167

Maison de verre / Pierre Chareau ; edited & photographed by Yukio Futagawa ; text & drawings by Bernard Bauchet ; text by Marc Vellay = Garasu no ie : Daruzasu-tei / Pi_ru Shar_ ; kikaku satsuei, Futagawa Yukio ;bun zumen, Berun_ru Boshe ; bun, Maru

161

Five architects : Eisenman, Graves, Gwathmey, Hejduk, Meier.

149

Library moves are never easy,, but I am fortunate to be surrounded  by beautiful books at an institution that values information in all its many formats. What makes the job even more rewarding is knowing, and having proof, that our collections are also so very much appreciated by our patrons.

Copyright Matters

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Association of Architecture School Librarians
Barbara Opar, column editor

Copyright continues to be a concern to the academic community. For the scholar, there is often a desire retain intellectual property rights of the content. For the teacher, there is a need to obtain and often distribute sought after materials to students.

But what is right in terms of practice? What is indeed fair?

Quite a number of venues provide useful information. Notable and trustworthy among them are:  The United States Copyright Office:  http://www.copyright.gov/

The Copyright Clearance Center (CCC), which was founded in 1978 as a not-for-profit organization is now offering its expertise through a series of free webinars:

The full list and links to registration are available at:  http://www.copyright.com/content/cc3/en/toolbar/aboutUs/eventsAndTradeshows.html

The University of Texas at Austin provides a clear “crash course”:   http://www.lib.utsystem.edu/copyright/

EDUCAUSE, which is a nonprofit association whose mission is advancing higher education through the intelligent use of information technology, offers this information about online course material:  http://net.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ERB0301.pdf

Digital Collaborations within and beyond the design academy: The Library transformed

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Barbara Opar, column editor

At this year’s conference in Boston, the Association of Architecture School Librarians sponsored a special focus session which explored some of the ways in which new technologies are continuing to transform how we collect, share, teach and experience the creative and scholarly record of the built environment. Moderated by Sarah Dickinson of the Harvard Graduate School of Design, the AASL panel addressed collaborations which take full advantage of the digital environment.

Hannah Bennett, Architecture Librarian at Princeton University was the first speaker and presented her views on the physical space of the library as a human research environment. Using a term drawn from sociology, Bennett discussed two paradigmatic libraries as case studies for the way in which architectural design can advance library technologies and research protocols. Gunnar Asplund’s Stockholm Public Library of 1928 has been nicknamed “the mind” and suggests a way to imagine the nature of research.  The second library, Norman Foster’s Philology Library at the Free University in Berlin, has been called “the brain” and looks to anticipate the rapid changes in library technologies. Seen together, the buildings present a contemporary understanding of the nature of intelligence.

The panel then turned to presentations of projects aimed at advancing scholarship through new library technology. Ann Baird Whiteside, Director of the Frances Loeb library at the GSD , and Jesse Shapins, an instructor at that institution, presented Zeega, an open-source HTML infrastructure built on public APIs which enables users to view, annotate and remix Harvard’s own digital collections with our repositories on the web.   At MIT, Façade: Future-proofing Architectural Computer-Aided design is a project which looks to identify, collect, manage, archive and make accessible CAD models and documentation.  Jolene de Verges, Digital Projects and Metadata Manager for MIT Libraries, described collaborative efforts with leading practitioners and how the work will benefit architecture libraries and archives.

At Notre Dame, Samantha Salden, an assistant professor, is collaborating with the Library to put forth a digital research portal on Seaside. Launched in September 2011, the Seaside Research Portal uses new technologies to archive, organize and present the architecture and urban design of Seaside, Florida. Jennifer Parker, the Architecture Librarian at Notre Dame, described how this project is benefitting the Library while embedding critical thinking, research, and precedent analysis into the studio curriculum.

Next month’s column will talk about other collaborations in architectural education as presented by speakers at the 2012 AASL conference.

 

New Frontiers in Research and Pedagogy: Collaborative Approaches in Architectural Education

/in /by

Barbara Opar, column editor

 

The Association of Architecture School Librarians held a second special focus session at the 2012 Boston meeting. This session examined ways in which faculty and librarians have collaborated to explore innovative approaches to the development of writing, research and design skills.

Gilda Santana from the University of Miami spoke to her work as a studio-embedded librarian. Gilda  works  directly with students in the design studio, instructing and assisting them in research at the point of use. Her presence in the design studio has helped to diminish the boundaries between the library and studio as well as to reinforce the concept of the library and librarian as design resources. Students see the relationship between research and design and have easy and direct access to an on-site librarian.

Research and design skills can also be impacted by new kind of tools being offered by certain libraries. To that end, Amy Trendler spoke to Ball State University’s Building Samples Collection. Amy noted the importance of collaboration in shaping the collection and tailoring its content and organization to meet the needs of patrons.

Heather McCann of MIT then described GIS Services at her institution. Architecture students  work with GIS tools and resources to find data, create base maps, explore demographics and terrain data and learn how to export this information into CAD and Adobe Illustrator. Faculty can request additional more targeted  training sessions to meet the needs of their specific classes.

Stacy Brinkman, the Art/Architecture Librarian at Miami University and Diane Fellows, Associate Professor presented an overview of their multi-year collaboration in terms of information literacy. Information literacy goals have been integrated into course learning objectives in the M. Arch pre-thesis  seminar. Concepts such as audience, authority, methodology, and different ways of evaluating information are embedded into writing assignments. Professor Fellows described how the use of methods already familiar to the architecture student- such as the sketch notebook, hand drawings, and even visual posters – have been  utilized  as concept generators to help explore the connection between visual thinking and the art of writing.

From reference and instruction to collection building, collaboration between faculty and librarians can take many shapes.  Each, however,  can help further the architectural education process.

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