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Exchange to UC Berkeley?
I am considering of doing a semester exchange to UC Berkeley. I am currently in a Masters of Architecture program in Australia. Just want to know if anyone here ever been on an exchange to Berkeley and what the experience was like? Also does anyone know what their current main research focus is?
Two of my favorit professors did their doctoral at Berkeley (one teaches Urban Design Theory and the other After Modernism Architectural Cultures). I have a strong interest in architecture in the strands of Aldo van Eyck, Giancarlo de Carlo, Herman Hertzberger, Colin Ward, Hasan Fathy etc etc type. Would Berkeley be a good place to do this?
I would be interested in your opinion. Thank you.
No one? Anyone
We recently had two students on exchange from Australia and New Zealand who did a semester here at Berkeley. I was in studio with one and I think he greatly enjoyed the atmosphere and academic environment here. If I remember correctly he took studio and a couple electives and had plenty of time to visit the city of San Francisco as well as other cities on the west coast. As for our current main research focus, I think Berkeley is a school that has a bit of everything and its up to the student to decide what focus they want. We have lots of professors here that focus on subjects ranging from parametric / digital design all the way to energy/building science and green/sustainability design. Currently I'm enrolled in a class with Renee Chow who is teaching a class called the Life of Form
Brief Description from syllabus
At the core of an architectural discipline is a literacy with form. Whether form is generated by a designer, homeowner, or builder, after its construction, any initial meaning ascribed to a form is inconsequential. Instead, as we bring our use and associations to form, its content and attributes becomes known. As such, forms act and have autonomous life within the environment -- whether urban, landscape or
architectural. The seminar develops such a literacy by exploring an autonomy of form within shifting frames of associations: cultural, material, scalar, etc. It also initiates what should be an on-going practice to observe, record and reason with spatial structures.
Much of what we are reading/ looking at during the seminar are works in the realm of Aldo van Eyck, Hertzberger, Habraken ..etc . Probably less focused on their work, but taking what they did and trying to implement into our own design process. I would check out the schedule of the semester you want to come and see if there are any classes that really interest you. Easily found on the CED website or schedule.berkeley.edu
Hi Juno, thanks for the reply. Sounds like a great class. I went to the CED website and also did a bit of google searching but couldn't find the subject Life of Form. Maybe you have a direct link?
Also I would also be interested if you have explanation on the masters focus area, especially on the international perspective one.
Cheers
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