It is encouraged, but not required, that students register for the technical methods seminar and intellectual domain seminar that is in the same graduate research group as their research studio. For those students taking an option studio, design studio or are on the thesis track, students should consider topic of interest when registering for the seminars.
Students are only allowed to retake a seminar of the same number if the course content has significantly changed since last registration. Please reach out to the instructor of the course to confirm this is the case before registering.
Technical Methods seminars explore strategies for conducting research in different focus areas of architecture, from visualization techniques, skill-building in the use of tools, and developing specific methods for technically-driven inquiry.
Sub-title: Logging
This course will examine material origins and the ethics of material consumption as it pertains to wood construction. Wood has been one of the most popular building materials, alongside clay and stone, for thousands of years. As a natural material, it is the perfect expression of our intimate connection with the world in which we live. In fact, no other plant species is as dear to humanity as the tree. To that end, students will manually enact the process of how a tree, a perennial plant with an elongated stem, becomes a log, a part of the trunk of a tree that has fallen, and finally becomes timber, wood prepared for use in building or carpentry. Throughout this material transformation, we will examine and interrogate the three-fold definition of logger:
Utilizing this multi-faceted definition of logger, we will directly engage with the material culture of the forest industry, which most, if not all of the technological innovations surrounding this industry have been attempts to standardize and homogeneous the material. That is, to kill the plant so it will behave and perform in a predictable and consistent manner – to strip it of its ‘wood-ness’. As a counterpoint to this historical trend, the course will aim to embrace the living, unpredictable, and irregular features inherent to all trees and graphic experiments will attempt to capitalize on these bizarre and eccentric qualities. Through deep experiential and hands-on learning, this course will attempt to rekindle the omnipresent relationship between people and wood.
Course contact hours will occur both on-campus (20%) and-off campus (80%) throughout the semester. Weekly discussions, field visits, material harvesting, and student presentations will involve spending time outdoors in parks, preserves, conservation zones, and state forests while interacting with ecologists, conservationists, loggers, foresters, and industry professionals. Hands-on exercises in our Fabrication Workshop(s) exploring log milling will supplement weekly readings, short-story writings, and graphic production.
Sub-title: Residential Weatherization
To address the climate crisis, New York State plans to reduce statewide greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 40% by 2030 and 85% by 2050. Unfortunately, recent estimates from the federal government show that GHGs continue to increase in the residential sector. This is especially poignant for the houses of Buffalo, estimated by the Census to have the oldest housing stock in the United States.
To learn how to reduce GHGs from residential buildings, this class will delve into the fundamentals of residential weatherization and energy auditing. Concepts to be discussed include the house as a system, typical building assemblies, and mechanical systems. This class will follow a flipped classroom format where students will spend most of their time in class dedicated to hands on activities to reinforce concepts learned outside of class. These activities include using energy auditing tools, performing a blower door test, and using thermal imaging cameras, necessary skills to learn how to identify and address problems in a house such as energy consumption, air leakage, and moisture control issues.
NOTE: THIS CLASS IS CLOSED UNTIL AFRER STUDIO REGISTRATION TAKES PLACE. This class is linked with the Ecological Practices studio taught by Nicholas Rajkovich; enrollment for the class will be managed by the Department of Architecture. If students are enrolled in the Ecological Practices Studio, they will be force registered into this class. Support for this class comes from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) under PON 3981: Energy Efficiency and Clean Technology Training.
Course description pending.
Sub-title: Elements of Urban Design
Urban design is distinctly different from architecture, as it takes place over a longer time frame, with less clearly defined goals, and impacting a far broader audience than just the client. The architectural blueprint has no equal in urban design, as the master plan is largely a relic of the past. Instead, urban designers have a host of tools and skills at their disposal to improve the physical environment through research, vision, guidance, and influence. This course will introduce these tools and skills, taking you on an excursion to the multifaceted processes that shape our cities. You will start the semester as an observer of the elements that make up our cities, from buildings and blocks to streets and public spaces. We then discuss the various roles and tools that urban designers have at their disposal, before deploying these tools to design a real-world setting in Buffalo.
Sub-title: Machine Production: Digitally Fabricated Assemblies
Investigate the role digital fabrication plays in architectural assemblies and why tools such as 3D printers, CNC routers, waterjet cutters and robotic arms are becoming increasingly prominent in the industry.
Through engaging our workshop's advanced machinery, we will focus on efficient processes, material mindfulness and machine workflows. Together we will weigh the variables of design and production in pre-fab assembly systems.
Students will receive training in programming and machine operation to complete a digitally fabricated assembly, acting as designer, operator and fabricator, gaining firsthand experience on our advanced machines.
Sub-title: Hidden [Hi]Stories. Hearing Silences
This graduate elective seminar delves into the understanding of often-unacknowledged narratives, omissions, and gaps within architectural history and theory. Through an interdisciplinary lens, students will critically explore the production of architectural knowledge and the construction of historical narratives. Using readings, discussions, and creative assignments, participants will interrogate the complexities of historical representation and the implications of overlooked histories within the built environment, while interrogating how inequities based on wealth, race, gender and physical ability intersect to written history. With a focus on gender and sexuality, the course emphasizes understanding epistemicide, archival gaps, and the role of power and ideology in shaping architectural history. Additionally, students have the opportunity to employ ficto-critical approaches in the development of the contents of a final manifesto or essay.
Intellectual Domain seminars explore the theoretical and historical knowledge-bases of various focus areas of architecture, with an emphasis on pursuing intellectual inquiry.
Course description pending.
Sub-title: Materializing Witness: spatial-temporal reconstruction from still and moving image media
This course invites advanced architecture students to develop a critical understanding—through hands-on practice—of how architectural visualization techniques can be applied to questions of legal accountability, journalism, and human rights. Taking inspiration from the work of Forensic Architecture, the New York Times Visual Investigations team, and other practitioners we will ask: spatially, how do we represent events? How can we harness our existing skills in modeling, drawing, and rendering not to sell a design, but to construct persuasive visual arguments about what did—or did not—happen?
Working with architectural “moments in time” as our raw material—archival photographs, satellite imagery, topographic data, video footage, and oral histories—students will investigate real-world incidents and produce spatial reconstructions in the form of drawings, diagrams, timelines, and video. The course combines case study analysis with technical workshops, challenging students to translate spatial evidence into compelling narratives. Emphasis will be placed on accuracy, transparency, and the ethics of visual representation in contested or opaque environments.
While this class makes extensive use of Blender as a visualization platform, it is not intended as a Blender modeling class. Instead, we’ll leverage the optical and spatial features of this open source software suite to reconstruct and represent events in space and time; matching videos and sequenced photos to modeled areas at room, block and neighborhood scale.
Blender is the central rendering and animation environment for the class. A free and open source application with widespread professional use and more than thirty years of development, it is also a favored tool of journalists, non-governmental actors and true crime reenactments. No previous Blender experience is necessary. However, a facility with 3D modelling in Rhino or Sketchup is required.
Course description pending.
Course description pending.
Sub-title: Material Matters
This seminar focuses upon the tectonic, the convergence of poetry and technique in architecture. The course explores innovative uses of materials through the examination of a series of contemporary buildings by distinguished international architects. It seeks to develop an understanding of how technical decisions in the deployment of materials, construction systems and details can be directed towards conceptual and cultural ends.
This exploration of making and meaning is pursued through studies of buildings that demonstrate a strong relationship between concept and construct together with a high level of integration of architectural, structural, services and enclosure systems. These studies examine ways in which digital design, production techniques and sustainability are changing the understanding of material optimization and producing new concepts of order.
The seminar is organized as a series of discussions focusing on case studies of built projects. These conversations revolve around readings, lectures and student presentations. Students will research buildings and demonstrate through the making of detailed analytical drawings and physical models their understanding of both the conceptual basis of the project’s design and its execution in built form.
Note: This course was previously taught with the course number ARC 549. Students have previously taken ARC 549 are not allowed to retake this seminar for graduate credit.
Any 500 level or higher graduate course at UB may count as an elective in the M.Arch program. If a student wishes to take a course outside of the Department of Architecture, they must work with the department offering the course to register. The courses below are those offered by the Department of Architecture. Note that these courses may have limited seats if they are dual listed with an undergraduate section.
Students who take additional techincal methods and intellectual domain seminars to what is required can use these courses as electives.
This course will be taught as two parallel narratives regarding Global Practices in Design. The first narrative will be a class by class overview of important movements in art, architecture and design over the past century. Key movements will be examined in relationship to the social, political and economic factors which either played a role in its formation or which was reacted against. The intent of this approach to instruction is to provide students with a framework by which to recognize the societal forces which have an impact on the production of art, architecture and design.
The second narrative of the course will survey small, cutting-edge architecture firms across the globe. We will begin with a review of the theory of 'critical regionalism' proposed by Kenneth Frampton in the 1980's and follow that up with several readings that reinforce and/or question the validity of this theory. Students will then focus on the work of architects and artists working in different countries across the globe. The intent of the course is to facilitate students understanding of the design process used by various architects and to critically examine the relationship of this design process to the particular social, political and cultural milieu of the region in which each architect is generating the work.
Sub-title: CommunIty–based Light Rail Infrastructure + Speculative Design proposals
We will design groovy Rail Stations for three potential Light Rail Rapid Transit (LRRT) Lines in conjunction with Citizens for Regional Transit (CRT): the historic Belt Line, the Kensington Line, and CRT’s Airport Corridor. We will map the proposed Lines, building on the work of last semester, and meet with community members and government officials to discuss routes and feasibility.
The semester will start by walking the Belt Line. We will then design new Stations, most likely in Larkinville and other key nodes in the City.
This seminar will examine options for career development in architecture and design. We will recognize traditional design based careers, but focus on developing a wider scope of career development for the built environment, explore pathways and build networks for early career growth and other opportunities. We will examine the role of the architect in relation to traditional private clients as well as not-for profits, granting agencies, educational institutions, and other public organizations. We will investigate how the practice of architecture can respond to our current economic, ecological, and political climates. We will welcome a range of guest speakers, analyze readings, and share perspectives through discussion. Students will also develop conceptual career roadmaps and/or business models.
ARC 584 does not substitute for ARC 582 (Professional Practice) which is required for all students in the M.Arch program.
This course equips graduate students with the skills and frameworks necessary to develop rigorous, original research within the disciplines of architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, historic preservation, planning, and allied fields. Students will refine research questions, articulate methodological approaches, identify and analyze variables, and construct compelling arguments grounded in both theory and data.
Recognizing the often artificial divide between design as prescriptive and research as analytic, the course challenges students to explore the interdependence of these modes of inquiry—particularly in relation to the social and physical dimensions of the built environment. Through this lens, students will interrogate the epistemological and ontological foundations of research and design, advancing integrated approaches that embrace complexity, uncertainty, and change.
The course is structured as a workshop in which students iteratively develop their own thesis, dissertation, or independent study proposals, receiving and offering critical feedback through peer reviews and instructor guidance. Alongside short reflective papers, students will engage key texts— including Architectural Research Methods by Groat and Wang—and pursue individualized readings tailored to their area of inquiry.
Open to graduate students in and interested in Architecture, Historic Preservation, Urban Design, History/Theory, Landscape Architecture, and Urban Planning.
For more specific information on courses including scheduled times, days, modality and restrictions, please see the class schedule.