Archinect - News

Studio Gang updates progress on mass timber conference center at Harvard

2024-12-17T16:12:00-05:00

The new David Rubenstein Treehouse conference center project from Studio Gang for Harvard University has topped out near its campus in the Allston neighborhood of Boston.

What will become Harvard’s first-ever mass timber structure is included as part of the larger 36-acre Enterprise Research Campus (or ERC) development that was announced last summer along with designs from MVRDV, Moody Nolan, and Marlon Blackwell. It follows another creative higher ed timber design from Studio Gang, the new two-building campus expansion for the California College of the Arts (CCA) in San Francisco, which was unveiled in November.

Harvard GSD completes first stage renovation of Gund Hall

2024-10-30T09:26:00-04:00

The Bruner/Cott Architects-led renovations to Gund Hall at the Harvard Graduate School of Design has concluded its first phase after work began to rehabilitate the building’s envelope at the end of the spring 2024 semester.

Both building efficiency and occupants' comfort have been improved with better insulation and an increased quality of light in most spaces as greater accessibility was made possible on the outside with the addition of new handrails and guardrails. The GSD's faculty building committee chair David N. Fixler said it was "important that the GSD project a spirit of innovation but also of legacy, of stewardship, of respect for the historic quality of [the building]."

Fixler had also previously called the project an important teaching tool for students interested in the preservation of other important mid-twentieth-century structures.

Get Lectured: Harvard University, Fall '24

2024-09-04T18:25:00-04:00

The Harvard GSD has shared its Fall 2024 public lectures series as part of our Get Lectured roundup of events taking place across the academic spectrum in the new semester.

The exciting lineup begins with professor Eric Höweler's presentation 'Clay: Pedagogy and Practice' on September 9 followed by Chelina Odbert's Margaret McCurry Lectureship in the Design Arts on September 12. Following that, the Senior Loeb Scholar Lecture featuring Malkit Shoshan, Tatiana Bilbao, and Elke Krasny will take place on September 24. Signe Nielsen closes the month with her presentation 'Parks and Monuments: A Cultural Evolution' on September 26.

October begins with a flourish when the 2021 Wheelwright Prize winner Germane Barnes returns to Cambridge to deliver his lecture 'Where This Flower Blooms' on October 7. The rest of the month's lectures include Theodore Spyropoulos (October 15); Sean Godsell (October 17); Jala Makhzoumi (October 22); Shoshan, Andrew Herscher, and Daniel Serwer (October 24); An...

How Architecture Firms Should Design Their Workplace: Harvard Online Course

2024-02-13T14:52:00-05:00

This post is brought to you by
Harvard Graduate School of Design Executive Education

While many fields have acclimatized to hybrid ways of working, architecture and design firms have encountered persistent challenges in making this transition.

Harvard GSD’s online course Designing the Creative & Collaborative Workplace: Space, Technology, and Culture looks at the unique spaces, technology, and culture shaping the creative workplace to help creative teams answer the question: “How will we redesign our workplace and the way we work?”

This discussion will be informed by research done by Jacob Reidel seeking to understand how architects have designed new ways of practicing in direct response to the upheaval of recent years.

Image courtesy Harvard GSD Executive Education.

Divided into three modules — Spaces, Technology, and Culture — the course will use a scaffolded approach to provide participants, regardless of background, with the resources to take actionable steps towards transformi...

How Harvard GSD's Executive Education Course Explores Designing the World’s Largest Passive House Office

2024-01-22T11:15:00-05:00

This post is brought to you by Harvard Graduate School of Design Executive Education

In response to global decarbonization mandates and changing occupant wants and needs, architects are racing to identify technologies, critical data, operating models, and financial cases that enable the success of building retrofits and designs. In Building Decarbonization 101: The Technology, Data, Operations, and Finances of Net Zero Development, participants will dig into groundbreaking buildings worldwide, hear from a global group of experts, and emerge with holistic strategies to apply to their projects.

Winthrop Center. Image courtesy Harvard GSD Executive Education.

A highlight of the program is Brad Mahoney, Director of Sustainable Development at MP Boston, diving into the development of Winthrop Center, the world's largest Passive House office space. Brad will use his experience with Winthrop Center to cover both smart and efficient building development and building decarbonization's financi...

Harvard GSD details Gund Hall renovations

2023-12-21T12:06:00-05:00

Harvard’s Graduate School of Design has unveiled plans for a slate of renovations that will culminate next year and are aimed at improving the user experience for students and faculty at 51-year-old Gund Hall in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The project will help preserve the familiar John Andrews design for new generations while serving as a model for the sustainable redevelopment of midcentury structures, the school announced. Boston-based Bruner/Cott Architects will be leading the process, leaning on its past renovation and remodeling of the Harvard Holyoke Center with Hopkins Architects that was completed in 2019.

The first phase of construction will insulate the building envelope in order to reduce energy costs and increase occupational comfort. Gund Hall’s iconic ‘trays,’ the terraced glass structures covering studio spaces will be reglazed. The GSD is testing out prototypes in Gund Hall’s 'The Pit' multiuse area and says they are especially hopeful for a hybrid vacuum-insulated ...

Explore Harvard GSD's latest Executive Education course on Blockchain and Real Estate

2023-12-13T09:00:00-05:00

This post is brought to you by Harvard Graduate School of Design Executive Education

While the NFT bubble has burst, the tantalizing potential of blockchain, which is the foundation of NFT’s, bitcoin, and other cryptocurrencies, endures. Some have even written that blockchain offers the “possibility of entirely reorganizing the profession” of architecture.

Harvard University Graduate School of Design Executive Education offers From Crypto to the Metaverse: Blockchain Applications in Real Estate to equip architects for this paradigm shift.

We asked Jose Luis Garcia del Castillo y Lopez, Lecturer in Architectural Technology at Harvard University Graduate School of Design, to introduce this January's program.

Video courtesy of Harvard GSD Executive Extension

We also asked him which applications of blockchain he is most excited about — he said (1) Tokenization (fractional asset ownership) and (2) Blockchain-enabled transfers of title and ownership claims.

Video courtesy of Harvard GS...

Harvard's new Enterprise Research Campus breaks ground in Boston

2023-11-14T18:59:00-05:00

A master plan project at Harvard University from Studio Gang, Henning Larsen, SCAPE, and Utile has begun construction in the Boston neighborhood of Allston.

The 36-acre Enterprise Research Campus (or ERC) will coalesce an area across the Charles River from the Ivy League campus into a new multi-use innovation district with designs from MVRDV, Moody Nolan, and Marlon Blackwell, in addition to the university's first above-ground mass timber structures from Studio Gang.

Once complete, its initial two phases will entail 14 acres of redeveloped land reserved for offices, labs, conference center, hotel, residential component, and open green space.

Image courtesy SCAPE

The effort was inaugurated in 2018 in the interest of creating a "gateway to a collaborative community," which is Boston's well-known consortium of knowledge industries.

Studio Gang founding principal and partner, Jeanne Gang, said her team’s plan has "provided a framework for a vibrant and inclusive public realm that bring...

Harvard Graduate School of Design Offers Online Course on AI for Architects

2023-11-13T09:15:00-05:00

This post is brought to you by Harvard Graduate School of Design Executive Education

A year after the launch of ChatGPT and the proliferation of generative AI tools, there remains enormous potential for architects able to harness AI-driven tools to solve their core challenges. That is why Harvard University Graduate School of Design Executive Education offers a course on AI, Machine Learning, and the Built Environment to design leaders seeking to understand this transformative technology better.

We asked Jose Luis Garcia del Castillo y Lopez, Lecturer in Architectural Technology at Harvard University Graduate School of Design, questions about AI in preparation for this January's program.

Courtesy of Harvard GSD Executive Education

Question: “I’m an architect. Can AI design buildings? Is my job getting replaced by AI?

Answer: “AI cannot design entire buildings, but it is true that certain aspects, more and more aspects of the architectural design process are being automated using A...

Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies publishes research on the state-by-state effectiveness of ADU policies

2023-11-10T18:36:00-05:00

The publication of a new research paper from the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University has provided policymakers with a useful nationwide assessment of different state-level policies regarding Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) in the United States.

The paper centers on two markets – New Hampshire and Portland, Oregon – as a means of comparing measured and more aggressive approaches (the latter having already been long-established as a national model).

Researchers were seeking to combat the “self-reinforcing negative cycle” that is born out of patchwork regulations and has made market conditions even more challenging to their production. The results offer proof, according to the authors, that “robust changes can have dramatic impacts.”

Related on Archinect: A possible future for ADUs and its growing 'familiarity factor'. Image courtesy of Abodu.

Comparisons of the failures of different approaches to by-right approvals in creating new housing in the New England states i...

MVRDV sets its feet in Boston with a two-tower residential design near Harvard University

2023-11-02T14:54:00-04:00

A new residential project in Boston from MVRDV and co-architect Moody Nolan will deliver much-needed housing accommodations for the burgeoning Enterprise Research Campus (ERC) district on the southern edge of Harvard University in Allston, Massachusetts.

The scheme remade a former industrial site located across from the Harvard Business School on Western Avenue into a new urban district with a 343-unit housing component (25% of which is considered ‘affordable’), new green spaces, and areas reserved for local small businesses.

Developed by Tishman Speyer using a master plan from Studio Gang and Henning Larsen, the district will serve as an innovation center with added laboratories, an office component, hotel, and a new conference center for the university. MVRDV says it will be sited in the middle of the plan, offering a connection to the Greenway, a two-acre open space linking to the Charles River. Local mainstays Utile, Inc. are also contributing to the master plan's landscape des...

60 Minutes spotlights the importance of indoor air quality

2023-10-31T14:50:00-04:00

For the Harvard professor, founder of the university's Healthy Buildings Program, our building design and public health officials have ignored indoor air systems for too long – that is, until the COVID pandemic hit. [...] "If you look at the way we design and operate buildings –and I mean offices, schools, local coffee shop[s] – we haven't designed for health," Allen said. "We have bare minimum standards."

Professor Joe Allen, who also does consultation work for developers, recently advised on the Amazon ‘HQ2’ project in Virginia from NBBJ. He and his colleagues at Harvard’s Healthy Buildings Program center their work around six research areas (Homes, Schools, Business, Materials, Climate, and Infectious Diseases), noting that humans spend, on average, 90% of their lives indoors. The project leverages studies and empirical evidence that have roots in 19th-century public health design and is now being aided by research into the effects of ventilation on the spread of COVID-19.

"All else equal, which building are you gonna go to? You have your choice right now: This building that put in healthy building controls, or this building that's designed the way we've always designed buildings, and is prone to being a sick building?" Allen told 60 Minutes, speaking about post-pandemic market standards.

A list of tools and resources compiled for designers by the program can be found here.

...

Get Lectured: Harvard University, Fall '23

2023-09-05T11:58:00-04:00

Our Get Lectured tour of public programming continues today with a stop by Cambridge, Massachusetts, for a look at the Fall events and lectures happening at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design.

Tuesday, September 12, will see editors Sean Canty, Zeina Koreitem, and John May discuss the launch of the new Harvard Design Magazine #51:Multihyphenate issue, followed by a panel discussion with each of this year’s Loeb Fellowship cohort on September 13. GSD alumnus Kongjian Yu will deliver the Sylvester Baxter Lecture on September 14, followed by a visit from Shigeru Ban on September 19. Rem Koolhaas and Irma Boom’s discussion on the role of book-making in the age of globalization follows their presentations on September 27, and the month culminates on September 28 with a lecture from Memphis Design pioneer Michele De Lucchi.

The next month begins with the Frederick Law Olmsted Lecture on October 10 with Anita Berrizbeitia. The Loeb Lecture on author David Gessen’s new book Th...

Harvard GSD details its new visual identity

2023-08-25T13:01:00-04:00

The Harvard Graduate School of Design (GSD) this week announced a new visual identity created in order to help galvanize its institutional and pedagogical aims, claiming it needed an "updated language of forms to communicate the school’s mission and values."

The rebranding effort comes in response to Dean Sarah M. Whiting’s previous call for the GSD community to establish a dialogue with the general public in a way that can embody the "critical design thinking" at the core of its educational program.

The new logo offers a further demarcation from the standard university crest-based designs used by Harvard’s other schools and undergraduate residential houses, embracing the 'Flying H' design invented by alum Nigel Smith into the GSD's graphics system to mark the turn of the 21st century.

Image courtesy Harvard GSD

The expressionistic form of John Andrews’ distinct Gund Hall building is a further source of inspiration for the new GSD Gothic typeface, which was the brainchild of the sc...

Travis Scott wants to pursue architecture at Harvard GSD when he retires from music

2023-05-27T08:00:00-04:00

Travis Scott has revealed that he plans to attend the illustrious Harvard University to study architecture once his rapping days are done. La Flame covered the latest issue of PIN-UP magazine on Wednesday (May 24) where he showcased his love for all things design from A-Z.

For PIN-UP’s Issue 34, Scott spells out his design principles across every letter of the alphabet, displayed through a visually exciting collection of photographs where the artist’s body replicated and contorted to make up the letters. "A" for him is "Architecture," in which he states: "Architecture is my true passion. I plan to apply to the architecture program at Harvard GSD when I’m done with music, which won’t be for a while. It would be dope to do both at the same time."

In 2018, Scott guest-lectured at Harvard, where he provided a master class on creativity to 500 students.

hey @trvisXX, get an early start on your architecture education at #A23Con DM us for a pass! https://t.co/14GlusB7w5
— AIA National (@AIANational) May 26, 2023

In addition to announcing his future plans, the rapper notes his appreciation for Brutalism and Postmodernism, along with Zaha Hadid. He also mentions how great of an inspiration the late multi-hyphenate Virgil Abloh has been to him, which can explai...

Baking soda may help concrete absorb carbon, MIT researchers find

2023-04-11T11:54:00-04:00

New research from MIT has found that adding sodium bicarbonate, otherwise known as baking soda, to concrete mixtures may make a significant dent in the material’s carbon footprint. The findings, published recently in the journal PNAS Nexus, also suggest that the addition of sodium bicarbonate may accelerate construction times through quicker concrete setting.

The research was led by MIT professors of civil and environmental engineering Admir Masic and Franz-Josef Ulm, MIT postdoc Damian Stefaniuk, doctoral student Marcin Hajduczek, and James Weaver from Harvard University’s Wyss Institute. With concrete production accounting for approximately 8 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions, and concrete being the world’s second most consumed material after water, the team sees innovation in the material’s environmental performance as being a key component to reducing global greenhouse gas emissions.

Deborah Berke Partners unveils completed adaptive reuse project for Harvard Law School

2023-03-07T15:35:00-05:00

A transformational new adaptive reuse project for Harvard Law School’s Lewis International Law Center has been completed recently by Deborah Berke Partners.

Meant to “holistically” meet the demands posed by modern legal education, the project remade the original 1957 Shepley, Bulfinch, Richardson, and Abbott design into a “porous, open connector” located at the heart of HLS’ Cambridge campus.

Photo: Chris Cooper, courtesy Deborah Berke Partners

Existing limestone edifices were removed to add an influx of natural light into the structure, which retained 80% of its original concrete foundation, steel-frame structure, and most of its modernist envelope. Terraces were added to the fifth floor and rooftop. A slate of new or repositioned entrances now helps to define the project’s exterior renovations, with the end of enabling greater accessibility to a campus that is now addressed from all sides.

Photo: Chris Cooper, courtesy Deborah Berke Partners

Photo: Chris Cooper, courtesy Deborah Ber...

MIT and Harvard scientists uncover the key behind ancient Rome's 'self-healing' concrete

2023-01-10T12:44:00-05:00

A team of researchers from MIT and Harvard University, working with laboratories in Italy and Switzerland, has made progress in understanding how concrete used by the ancient Romans has lasted for millennia. The discovery, outlined in a new paper published in the journal Science Advances, centers on the ancient civilization’s use of white lime minerals in their concrete mix, which can “self-heal” the material over time.

The white chunks, often referred to as “lime clasts,” had previously been disregarded as evidence of poor mixing practices by the Romans, with researchers instead attributing the durability of ancient Roman structures to the use of volcanic ash in cement mixes. However, the latest findings suggest the lime clasts are, in fact, the ingredient that gave the concrete a self-healing capability.

“The idea that the presence of these lime clasts was simply attributed ...

Emily Grandstaff-Rice officially inaugurated as AIA 2023 President

2022-12-12T07:51:00-05:00

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has officially inaugurated Emily Grandstaff-Rice, FAIA, as its 99th president. She recently joined Perkins&Will’s Boston studio as a senior project manager and associate.

Grandstaff-Rice comes with a breadth of leadership experience under her belt with AIA National. In 2017, she was elected to serve as a 2018-2020 at-large director. She also chaired the Equity and Future of Architecture Committee from 2017 to 2020 and the Equity in Architecture Commission from 2015 to 2016. Additionally, Grandstaff-Rice was the President of the Boston Society of Architects.

Grandstaff-Rice holds a Bachelor of Architecture from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and a Master of Liberal Arts in Educational Technology from Harvard University.

Previously on Archinect: AIA President-elect Emily Grandstaff-Rice joins Perkins&Will's staff in Boston

“The AIA is a window that looks towards a brighter, more sustainable, and equitable future for the profession,” said ...

Meet the first class of Harvard Climate Justice Design Fellows

2022-05-24T11:02:00-04:00

Harvard University has today announced its first-ever cohort for the brand new Climate Justice Design Fellowship, recognizing young leaders across the country in the fields of environmental justice advocacy, law, and climate organizing.

The first class of fellows consists of seven members, primarily from the non-profit sector. Each fellow will be tasked with pursuing data-oriented tools (e.g., the First Street Foundation’s new wildfire risk map) to aid their individual communities’ strides toward environmental justice.

The fellowships are funded through Harvard’s Institute for Quantitative Social Science (IQSS) and are pilot programs of the broader Harvard-Google Data+Climate Initiative that incorporates proprietary innovations like Google Data Commons and the data visualization service Glue to further empower both scholars and engineers to fight challenges related to climate change.

The progress of the fellowship can be followed online on both Twitter and Instagram. Scroll down to...

Chicago Architectural Biennial opens new exhibition space at the Chicago Cultural Center

2022-03-29T17:41:00-04:00

The Chicago Architecture Biennial has announced the opening of the CAB Studio, a new, year-round exhibition space located on the first floor of the Chicago Cultural Center. The studio will be a space to explore design and present innovative ideas. It will host exhibitions, programs, and events, along with youth and family activities.

CAB Studio will open with the exhibition, Architecture of Reparations, by New York-based collaborative Riff Studio, including designers Isabel Strauss, Rekha Auguste-Nelson, and Farnoosh Rafaie. It incorporates a study of public policy, architectural history, and reparations to tell the story of the erasure in Bronzeville, a historic Black neighborhood in the South Side of Chicago. This is the focus and outcome of a thesis project by Strauss while studying at the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

The exhibition uncovers the history and tells t...

Germane Barnes is Harvard GSD's 2021 Wheelwright Prize winner

2021-05-10T15:26:00-04:00

Harvard's Graduate School of Design announced the winner of the 2021 Wheelwright Prize: architect and Assistant Professor at the University of Miami School of Architecture Germane Barnes will receive the coveted $100,000 fellowship fund to support his two-year research project Anatomical Transformations in Classical Architecture. Barnes proposes to examine Roman and Italian architecture through the lens of non-white constructors, studying "how spaces have been transformed through the material contributions of the African Diaspora while creating new architectural possibilities that emerge within investigations of Blackness."

Germane Barnes' research proposal was selected from a field of finalists that also included Iulia Statica, Luis Berríos-Negrón, and Catty Dan Zhang.

Dark Mode. Photo: Blair Reid Jr.

"The past year has shown the world that marginalized communities offer more than a cursory look but a thorough excavation of their contributions and legacies," Barnes said. "As a Black...

Harvard, MIT sue Trump administration over new foreign student rules

2020-07-08T15:00:00-04:00

Following a surprise announcement that foreign students will not be allowed to remain in the United States if their colleges adopt all-online education for the coming semester, Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have sued the federal government to stop the order.

The Harvard Crimson reports that the lawsuit seeks "a temporary restraining order and preliminary and permanent injunctive relief to bar the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Immigration and Customs Enforcement from enforcing federal guidelines barring international students attending colleges and universities offering only online courses from staying in the United States."

The announcement of the new federal guidelines came a day after many universities, including Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, and MIT, began to announce plans for a mostly online Fall semester. It is currently unclear how the ruling will impact schools of architecture, as many of the schools Archinect has reached ...

Sarah Whiting outlines six point plan for addressing structural racism at Harvard GSD

2020-06-15T17:59:00-04:00

Following advocacy efforts from the African American Student Union (AASU) and AfricaGSD at Harvard University, Harvard GSD Dean Sarah Whiting has unveiled a list of steps the school will take as it works to address institutional failures on issues of anti-racism and racial equality.

In the aftermath of the nationwide protests in support of the Black Lives Matter movement that have prioritized a renewed focus on dismantling racist policies and practices across the country, student activists with AASU and AfricaGSD published a 13 point memo demanding that Harvard GSD "actively institutionalize anti-racism and acknowledge that pedagogy has a cultural obligation." The letter asks GSD to "restructure all courses at the GSD to include Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) voices," hire more Black faculty, staff, and administrators, reform how the school curates its guest critic panels and lecture series, and retrain its staff to understand racial dynamics in the United States, amo...

GSD students launch Harvard Indigenous Design Collective

2020-06-04T16:05:00-04:00

Harvard University Graduate School of Design students Elsa Hoover, Zoë Toledo, Heidi Brandow, and Jaz Bonninou have come together to create the Harvard Indigenous Design Collective (HIDC), a group that "promotes design by and for Indigenous communities as foundational to the history, theory, and practice of design fields."

The four students all hail from Native American backgrounds themselves and, according to the The Harvard Gazette website, represent the largest cohort of Native American students to ever attend the school at once.

Bonnin, a student in the M.Des. program of Yankton Sioux, Blackfoot, Irish, Danish, French, Panamanian, and Mexican Native descent, tells The Harvard Gazette, "I am enrolled in a master’s of design program, focusing on issues of conservation and preservation. My goal is to specialize in designing atriums, courtyards, and indoor-outdoor garden spaces for small-scale residential, commercial and adaptive-reuse clientele.”

Hoover, an M.Arch. student of Anish...

Universities begin planning for an unpredictable fall semester

2020-04-29T18:59:00-04:00

As the spring semester comes to close following a swift transition to remote and online learning, the anxiety of the last two months has begun to give way to deeper, existential worries regarding what the future might hold for universities this summer and next semester.

Some universities have begun or are close to announcing changes for the coming summer term, including a continued focus on online learning. In the architecture realm, for example, online-heavy Boston Architectural College recently announced an online-only summer schedule slated to start July 6th. Other schools, whose summer intensive design initiatives act as critical feeder programs to traditional academic year enrollment, will follow suit with their own plans soon.

Previously on Archinect: “Studio culture goes online at Taubman College.”A screenshot from a recent group crit conducted by Cyrus Peñarroyo titled "TBD/IRL." Image courtesy of Cyrus Peñarroyo / Taubman School of Architecture and Urban Planning.

But the b...

GSD Dean Sarah Whiting to temporarily “step back” from duties for cancer treatment

2020-04-06T14:11:00-04:00

Sarah M. Whiting, the new dean at the Harvard University Graduate School of Design, has announced that she will be stepping back from her administrative duties temporarily in order to undergo cancer treatment.

Previously on Archinect: “Deans List: Sarah Whiting on Taking The Helm of Harvard's Graduate School of Design.” Sarah M. Whiting. Image courtesy of Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer.

In a letter from Whiting published by Harvard Magazine, the dean writes that she was recently diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and that she “will be taking a partial step back from my daily dean-related responsibilities so that I can begin treatment,” adding, “Fortunately, Harvard and the Boston area are home to some of the finest health care providers in the world, and so I am in good hands.”

While Whiting is undergoing treatment, GSD Professor of Urban Design and Planning Rahul Mehrotra will act as “Dean Designate” while Professor of Landscape Architecture and Technology Niall K...

Introducing Archinect's Spotlight on Boston

2020-03-03T15:40:00-05:00

For the month of March, Archinect is focusing its Spotlight on Boston, the largest city in Massachusetts and the northernmost node of America's Northeast megalopolis.

The focus on Boston follows our recent Spotlight on Miami theme from the month of February.

Boston, of course, has a relatively long history dating back to 1630s when it was first settled by Puritan colonizers from England. In the 390 years since, Boston has grown from a powerful shipping town and a major site of the American Revolution into an intellectual and biomedical powerhouse, home to some of the country's most prestigious schools and universities, including Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which are located in the adjacent city of Cambridge.

Simmons Hall on the MIT campus, designed by Steven Holl Architects. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons / Daderot.

In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the city worked to rectify some of the destruction caused by 1950s-era Urban Renewa...

Toshiko Mori is inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters

2020-03-02T17:33:00-05:00

Notable Japanese architect and academic Toshiko Mori has been inducted as a new member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters honor society. Consisting of writers, architects, artists, and composers, the Academy's members are chosen for their efforts to promote and sustain interests in music, fine arts, and literature.

Mori's list of accomplishments reflects her dedication to architectural academia and practice. She is the founder and principal of New York-based Toshiko Mori Architect, in addition to being Harvard GSD's first female tenured professor and first female chair for the department of architecture. Mori is currently the Robert P. Hubbard Professor in the Practice of Architecture at GSD.

Below is a list of this year's newly induced members:

Art:

Laurie Anderson
Carroll Dunham
Toshiko Mori
Julian Schnabel
Amy Sillman
Carrie Mae Weems

Literature:

Edwidge Danticat
Mary Gaitskill
Barry Lopez
Mona Simpson
Colson Whitehead

Music:

Terry Riley
Chinary Ung

To learn more about the honors ...

Rahul Mehrotra selected to lead GSD's Department of Urban Planning and Design

2020-02-20T12:42:00-05:00

The Harvard University Graduate School of Design (GSD) has named architect and academic Rahul Mehrotra as the new Chair of the Department of Urban Planning and Design at the school.

Mehrotra is also being named to the position of John T. Dunlop Professor in Housing and Urbanization. Mehrotra joined GSD as a faculty member back in 2010 and served until 2015 in the same position he is being elevated to once again. At that point, Mehrotra shifted to become the Director of the Master of Architecture in Urban Design Degree Program and Co-Director of the Master of Landscape Architecture program. NBBJ principal architect and academic Alex Krieger is currently serving as the Interim Chair of the Department of Urban Planning and Design; He took over the position from Diane Davis in 2017.

Mehrotra is the founder and principal of RMA Architects, a Boston and Mumbai-based firm that works cross a variety of project types, including speculative work. The practice helped craft a conservation plan...