Course overview
Urban design is the profession and discipline concerned with the shaping of cities. Traditionally concerned with the spatial and material layers of the city, urban design today also encompasses the "content" of urban spaces - their social, performative, and experiential dimensions. Through a combination of historical survey, theoretical framings, case studies, and contemporary questions, this course critically maps the variety of approaches to shaping urban spaces and places, in pursuit of their animating principles and ideologies.
Course learning outcomes
- To expose students to a range of historical precedents, theoretical ideas, case studies, and field experiences relevant to the study and practice of urban design and planning.
- To situate urban design within its social, cultural, political, technological, and aesthetic context.
- To facilitate the development of a rigorous intellectual framework for design and research on cities, and an awareness of the student’s emerging personal theoretical position and approach to urban design.
- To develop skills in the representation, analysis, and interpretation of urban places and spaces, in both textual and graphic modes, using both analogue and digital techniques.
- To develop critical and analytical thinking along with the ability to communicate this thinking (writing, oral and graphic presentation, other media).
- To foster capacities to generate, coordinate, share, and debate ideas and proposals in collaboration with others.