Five years ago, Ahmad Zaki Sarfaraz returned to Afghanistan with a UB degree in hand and aspirations to rebuild his war-torn country with the tools of urban planning.

A movement that came to be known as the School of Architecture and Planning's “maker culture” emerged in the 1990s. It expressed an interest in hands-on work, a desire to build at full-scale, a curiosity to explore the properties of building materials, an inclination to experiment and, most of all, a drive to experience the materiality of architecture in an unmediated way. 

A perforated metal facade developed by UB architecture professor Christopher Romano and Buffalo-based Rigidized Metals Corp. has earned an Architect's Newspaper Editors' Choice award for Best of Products in the facade category.

In line with our 50th anniversary focus on innovation in building and materials, we take a look back into the catalog of Professor Annette LeCuyer, who has authored several books on building technology in contemporary architecture. 

UB architecture professor Dennis Maher knew he had a rare find when he happened upon a bucket of aged architect’s drawings at a Buffalo estate sale two years ago.

An urban planning studio that explored the historic value of building typologies along Niagara Falls Boulevard that date back to its origins as a mid-century tourist strip has been recognized by the New York Upstate chapter of the American Planning Association. 

State-sponsored housing projects dating back to the socialist era are a ubiquitous presence across Eastern Europe, particularly in the Baltic Countries. Housing Estates in the Baltic Countries , the latest book edited by Daniel B. Hess, UB professor and chairperson of urban planning, focuses on the formation and later socio-spatial trajectories of such projects in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.

Dziama has gained professional experience in the field of architecture with the office Davidson Rafailidis - directed by UB architecture professors Georg Rafailidis and Stephanie Davidson - where she assisted with the production of stop motion animations exhibited at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto, Cinema Ideal at the Lisbon Architecture Triennale, and BIO:50 the 2th Biennale of Design in Ljubljana, Slovenia. She has also collaborated with media artist Stanzi Vaubel producing drawings and fabricating inflatable performance spaces for Buffalo's Indeterminacy Festival.

Urban planning scholar Vanessa Watson will visit the University at Buffalo next week to host conversations with the university and surrounding community on the intersection of rapid urbanization in Africa with issues of equity and conflict around food security and global health.