Architecture

Craig Barton — Department Chair
Charles Menefee — Director of Architecture
Michael Bednar — Director of Undergraduate Advising

As citizens working in the evolving and inherited ecologies of the contemporary city, we recognize that the scales of endeavor that once separated our disciplines now define a common ground. We are forging a new collaboration to explore dynamic design strategies that engage the continuous flux of social, political and environmental processes. We are committed to the unique role of the designer’s skill in imagining our cities anew on a foundation of historical understanding.

About the Department

Architecture and Landscape Architecture share a design ethic that critically engages three areas of design research:

• the interdependence of cultural forces and ecological processes
• the ethical choices inherent in the discipline of construction
• the implications of emerging technologies for the design of spaces, sites and systems

These issues are developed across the scales and resources of each discipline through student and faculty work in parallel, collaborative and multi-disciplinary studios and seminars. As these threads of design investigation interact, new poetic possibilities emerge that are visible in the products of our unique perspective.

In the design of buildings, landscapes and urban infrastructure, working simultaneously at the scale of the hand and that of the city, we share the responsibility for creating a stimulating and sustainable setting for the development of diverse cultural expression. We work close at hand and travel great distances, from Charlottesville, Washington and New York to Barcelona, Venice and Beijing. We apply our hands to the making of things, open our minds to the voices of multiple communities and extend our reach in a network of collaborations across the university and beyond. We study the dynamic fullness of the sites we enter, taking seriously our power to reveal and transform them.

In environmental science, the term “ecotone” describes the space of a boundary or edge where two ecosystems overlap, a place of great diversity and enhanced complexity that reveals the sometimes frictional dynamics of the intersecting ecologies. This is our territory, from which we advance the critical significance and catalytic potential of our academic discourse and professional engagement.

The Department of Architecture and Landscape Architecture is situated in a multi-disciplinary school that also includes Departments of Architectural History and Urban & Environmental Planning. Cross-disciplinary engagement is a pervasive phenomenon, with each program benefiting from this rich context. Certificate programs in American Urbanism and Historic Preservation bring together students and faculty from each of the four disciplines in a course of study overlaid on the curriculum of each field.

Degrees

The department offers three degree programs: Master of Architecture, Master of Landscape Architecture and Bachelor of Science in Architecture. All three programs are anchored by a rigorous design curriculum that provides a forum for synthesizing parallel studies in history, theory, technology, and representation. In keeping with the public mission of the University of Virginia that dates to its founding, these programs are committed to developing the next generation of civic and professional leaders.

The Master’s degrees are accredited in their respective professions and a post-professional degree is offered in architecture. Graduate students also pursue degrees in more than one field with increasing frequency. In order to facilitate this offering, we have developed typical curricula for the pursuit of dual degree options, which require independent admission to both programs.

The Bachelor of Science degree is offered in a pre-professional program providing the balance of a broad liberal arts foundation with a rigorous studio preparation for graduate study in architecture. Undergraduate Minors in Landscape Architecture and American Urbanism as well as other fields in the School and the University provide vehicles for focused complementary study. An Architectural Studies Concentration in the Bachelor of Science program offers an opportunity for design oriented research outside of the studio curriculum in the final year.

Accreditation

In the United States, most state registration boards require a degree from an accredited professional degree program as a prerequisite for licensure. The National Architectural Accrediting Board (NAAB), which is the sole agency authorized to accredit U.S. professional degree programs in architecture, recognizes three types of degrees: the Bachelor of Architecture, the Master of Architecture, and the Doctor of Architecture. A program may be granted a 6–year, 3–year, or 2–year term of accreditation, depending on the extent of its conformance with established educational standards.

Master’s degree programs may consist of a pre–professional undergraduate degree and a professional graduate degree that, when earned sequentially, constitute an accredited professional education. However, the pre–professional degree is not, by itself, recognized as an accredited degree.