BArchArchitecture

Research labs and external partners

During your final two years in the BArch program, you’ll have the freedom to explore your specific interests in advanced studios and seminars that are closely tied to our research labs:

• Digital Craft Lab: Features experimental making through emerging technologies. Advanced computation, robotics, responsive environments, and rapid prototyping are motivations to reconsider how architecture is produced.
• Urban Works Agency: Responds to the politics of the contemporary city. Equity, ecological vitality, and economic resilience are reimagined through urban and territory scaled analysis, narratives, and arguments.
• Architectural Ecologies Lab: Serves as a platform for collaborative research between designers, scientists, and manufacturers. This interdisciplinary setting provides the tools to address ecological challenges like sea level rise, habitat restoration, and climate change.
• History Theory Experiments (HTX): A platform for advanced interdisciplinary research and critical engagement in architecture that explores alternative modes of historical practice, discourse, and spatial activism.

You’ll build upon your knowledge of design discourse, media, and technology as you explore digital fabrication, sustainable building practices, and more. Studio and seminar work is also framed around collaborations with external partners, such as Autodesk, Kreysler & Associates, the San Francisco Planning Department, and the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy, to champion real-world experiences with cross-disciplinary teams.

Professional internships and study-abroad courses

Our program’s internship requirement connects you with renowned Bay Area architecture firms. This not only helps you secure employment after graduation, but also gives you a first-hand look at the daily processes you’ll encounter throughout your career.

We also encourage students to study abroad during the summer semester. Recent courses have explored innovative public spaces in Berlin and formal experimentation in new domestic architecture in Tokyo.

Our faculty are practicing architects and full-time academics whose expertise forms the backbone of our four specialized research labs. They’re deeply connected to research, practices, and processes, as well as a wide network of leaders who shape international discourse on architecture and interior design. Faculty provide students with the one-on-one guidance they need to formulate critical questions and imagine innovative proposals in their studio work.

Our alumni work for national and international architecture firms or work as designers at global companies like IDEO, Apple, Airbnb, and WeWork. Alumni also establish their own practices in architecture, design/build, or fabrication. Many continue their studies at leading graduate programs to deepen their knowledge in specific areas. Wherever they are in the world, they strive to make a positive impact on the built environment.

Our students are ready to make a difference in the world. You see architecture as a way to positively shape the relationships between structures, people, and the environment. You’re often just as interested in cutting-edge digital technology as you are in the slow, methodical process of working by hand. Above all else, you’re driven to find innovative solutions to the environmental, political, and social challenges we face today.