Student/Faculty Advisors/Time/Location
Thesis Projects
Andrea Aguilar
Advisor: Maxwell Jarosz
Building Design for Real Estate Crisis
In the wake of the pandemic and shifts in work dynamics and economic uncertainties, the commercial real estate sector faces difficult challenges. With record-breaking levels of office space vacancies and projections of declining property values, the industry demands innovative solutions to navigate through the storm. My thesis advocates for the adoption of flexible office building designs and integrated amenities as a strategic response to the evolving present, supported by the comprehensive study of generational preferences and leadership crises.
The most important part in this proposed solution is the recognition of the need for flexibility. Traditional office spaces no longer suffice to meet the diverse and evolving needs of modern businesses. Through my extensive study encompassing different generations and leadership tiers, it became evident that flexibility is crucial in attracting and retaining tenants. Millennials and Gen Z, in particular, prioritize agility and adaptability in their work environments. By offering flexible spaces that can accommodate various work styles and configurations, landlords can tap into this changing market segment and ensure sustained occupancy rates.
Moreover, the integration of amenities within office buildings emerges as the main strategy. Amenities not only enhance the appeal of the workplace but also contribute to creating a vibrant and engaging environment for employees. From wellness facilities and collaborative spaces to dining options and recreational areas, amenities enrich the overall tenant experience, fostering a sense of community and well-being. Through my research, I discovered that amenities play a crucial role in influencing leasing decisions across all the different generations and leadership levels. They serve as differentiators, enabling landlords to stand out in a competitive market and command better rents even after economic downturns.
Furthermore, the adoption of mixed-use buildings emerges as a prudent approach to mitigating financial risks. In conclusion, the future of office building design lies in embracing flexibility and integrating amenities within office spaces. By aligning with the preferences of different generations and leveraging insights into leadership dynamics, landlords can position themselves for success in an increasingly volatile market. Flexible office spaces and integrated amenities not only address the immediate challenges facing the industry but also lay the foundation for sustainable growth and resilience in the long term.
Paria Bahmani
Advisor: Sophie Juneau (Primary), Rodolphe el-Khoury (Secondary)
Improving and Enhancing Collaboration and well being with virtual reality in Architecture Firm
In the current landscape characterized by a dynamic shift in workplace paradigms, where emphasis is on redefining traditional work experiences to prioritize well-being and engagement, there emerges a critical need to reassess the methodologies of office design and the integration of tools within our professional environments. This thesis aims to incorporate virtual reality as a transformative tool in architecture firms, with the objectives of augmenting project comprehension, optimize design visualization , facilitating communication and enriching overall workplace satisfaction.
Dagmar Paola Barron Nava
Advisors: Sophie Juneau (Primary), Hector Fernando Burga (Secondary)
Cultivating Connections: Redeveloping Mississippi Fairgrounds into a Sustainable Food Hub
An integrated architectural intervention that addresses the challenges of preserving the state’s agricultural heritage while promoting healthy food systems and community development. Reusing and redesigning the existing fairgrounds as a multifunctional hub, that celebrates the state’s farming traditions, livestock, and aquaculture production, supports local farmers, and fosters a culture of food resilience and education.
Maryam Basti
Advisors: Veruska Vasconez (Primary), Valery Augustin (Secondary)
Integrating Social and Affordable Housing Development with Urban Garden to Address Food Insecurity in Los Angeles, California
In response to the pressing issues of inadequate access to fundamental necessities such as healthy food options, secure shelter, and stable employment and the identified challenges associated with the median income of City of Los Angeles, this thesis proposes a transformative solution: the integration of social and affordable housing with urban garden.
Households with housing cost burdens and extreme housing cost are concentrated in southern and eastern neighborhoods of Los Angeles; and Census tracts with high percentages of cost burdened households are clustered in the south and west of this area.
The 9 census tracts situated east of the General Hospital site exhibit a landscape dominated by industrial and institutional land uses, while their residential zones maintain low density, primarily influenced by the hilly topography of the area. This region meets the dual criteria for a “food desert” as a result of the combination of low-income levels and limited access to a major supermarket. Additionally, the locale experiences spillover demand from younger residents in search of more affordable housing options in proximity to Downtown LA. Furthermore, there is a noticeable pent-up demand for larger housing units, reflecting the desire to accommodate multi-generational living arrangements. Developers, including those focused on affordable housing, advise against an all-affordable project, emphasizing the importance of pursuing a mix of income levels for a more sustainable and inclusive housing strategy.
Focused on the USC Medical campus, particularly the historic Art Deco building of General Hospital by leveraging the ongoing discussions about the reconstruction and retrofitting of the site to become a Healthy Living Hub by educating people toward healthier lifestyle. By intertwining these potential solutions, this thesis advocates for a sustainable and community-centric approach to enhance the overall well-being of South Los Angeles residents.
Maria Adalgisa Cannavo V
Advisors: Maria Gabriela Flores, Denis Hector
Blueprints for Resilience - Rethinking Middle School Architecture in Miami-Dade
This thesis explores innovative architectural approaches to middle school design in Miami-Dade. It highlights how educational environments can be designed to promote sustainability and environmental stewardship. By integrating water management, solar energy, and food production into the school's infrastructure, I propose a holistic approach that goes beyond traditional classroom-based learning.
This project considers the importance of experiential learning, adaptability to the effects of climate change, community engagement outside the classroom, interdisciplinary approaches, and the potential for these design principles to be applied to other educational institutions.
The goal of this approach is to create immersive school environments that not only educates but embodies the principles of environmental stewardship.
Drew Dunphy
Advisors: Joachim Perez, Christopher Meyer
DE | FRAMING THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT
To design is to challenge what has come before to create something new. In today's modern era of architecture, there has been an explosion of new programs and materials that facilitate the design process and have increased the production rate exponentially. In doing so, the profession has accepted standard practices as rules and allowed material use and industry to become rigid.
Challenging what makes our industry run is not easy, but it is necessary to continue driving innovation. Using Mass Timber as a Case Study, Deframing the Built Environment looks holistically at manufacturing, architecture, and construction in an attempt to break down what is immediately accepted as best practice.
Deframing the Built Environment breakes the process by which design goes from raw materials to an inhabitable space into three focus areas. Starting with the manufacturing process, it challenges the current centralized system of material sourcing and calls for a regionalist approach that emphasizes sustainable sourcing. From there, it stresses the importance of integrated design that reorients the cost from strictly economic to include ecological and temporal costs of design. Finally, Deframing the Built Environment rejects the accepted lifespan of a building by focusing on architecture that is easy to assemble, inhabit, and disassemble with a low margin of wasted material.
Design should be synonymous with innovation, and while this thesis focuses on mass timber, questioning the process of taking materials and transforming them into space should and must be applied across all materials and building practices.
Alexander Glass
Advisor: Max Jarosz
Modular Flex Core - Prefabricated Flex Units
My thesis aims to provide a desirable entry level housing unit. This will be achieved by designing a prefabricated wall assembly that can be clipped onto an existing modular steel system that is already being manufactured. This will help reduce
construction in all phases of a project. Through this process I also indent to redesign the existing floor plan that the manufacture provides. This altered design is intended to create a flexible housing unit that offers versatile living arrangements to adapt to residents changing needs.
Quan Le
Advisors: Maxwell Jarosz (Primary), Jorge L. Hernandez (Secondary)
Hanoi 36
The thesis is about a project that will preserve Hanoi’s national Heritage – the Ancient Quarter. The site is a network of 36 commercial districts, formed by skillful merchants and artisans 1000 years ago – an equivalent to a guild system in Medieval Europe. Each street is defined by a specialty that is operated by a corresponding guild.
The Ancient Quarter holds rich cultural and architecture artistic values as it is the combination of Western colonial and Vietnam traditional style, which is so distinct even when compared to other shophouse districts in East Asia. However, it is giving up its identity due to heavy urbanization. As each block formed hundreds of years ago, they followed a rule which their house units surrounding an existing well, and each house through time develop in one direction toward the well -- the center of each block, so over many generations later, these I shaped houses can’t get any longer as they all reached the well, causing problems in privacy, hygiene, and fire hazard.
The solution is not only an answer that solve the contradiction between residents’ benefits and the city’s heritage preservation plan, but also a chance to promote the Ancient Quarter as an intentional monument, that inspires later Vietnamese architecture designs. If architecture is the evidence, the expression of accumulated wisdom from generations of the community behind it, then the project can act as the first step for this nation to actually develop, progress its architecture which is left in neglection in a long period of wars, to be able to connect the fragmented past, to not wasting the wisdom accumulated through Vietnamese’s ancestors over thousands of years, so a firm future backed by Vietnam’s rich traditional culture can be built.
Mia Mackovski
Advisors: Sophie Juneau (Primary), Allan Shulman (Secondary)
Village Memories: The Journey to The Rakija Inn
Delve into the heart of Brajchino, Macedonia, a village steeped in ancestral ties and renowned for its lush orchards and vibrant annual festival honoring Saint Petka. My research embarks on a journey to reintroduce the age-old tradition of apple Rakija production, a beloved fruit brandy deeply ingrained in Balkan culture. With a primary objective of safeguarding the rich cultural legacy of the region, this thesis endeavors to shed light on the historical significance and modern revitalization of this village, while simultaneously examining the local industry with a specific focus on gastronomy.
Beyond the preservation of tradition, my thesis contends that the establishment of the Rakija industry holds the promise of catalyzing tourism development in Brajchino. This dual-purpose initiative not only seeks to honor the past but also aims to pave the way for sustainable tourism practices and economic prosperity within the community. Join me in uncovering the potential of Brajchino's cultural heritage as we embark on a journey to embrace tradition, foster innovation, and cultivate sustainable growth in this picturesque Balkan village.
Caroline Rothschild
Advisors: Veruska Vasconez, Richard John
Enhancing Synagogue Security and Identity Through Architecture
The original architectural identity of the synagogue has long been lost as a result of the disruption of the diaspora and the passage of time. The average American synagogue today bears little relationship to the most important sacred buildings of ancient Israel: the First and Second Temples. The floor plan given to the Jews by God in the Torah indicates how to position the ark and the bimah, and yet today their locations are based on the layout of a Christian church. We face Jerusalem and read from a book dating back over 3,000 years; we cover our heads and count our tefillin; we hold on to our traditions and celebrate how they make us who we are and reflect on how they solidified our survival. We do all this, however, our buildings reflect our need to hide. Today synagogues blend anonymously into their locations. Their architecture has been camouflaged to the extent that even the floor plans are ecclesiastical. In this thesis, cognizant of the current heightened threat, I have incorporated a wide range of security measures, so the building no longer needs to be hidden thus allowing the identity of the Jewish people to come to life through architecture.
Delaney Skelly
Advisors: Joachim Perez (Primary), Germane Barnes (Secondary)
[UN]CAGING ARCHITECTURE
Description: “A research analysis on the systematic and architectural features of the American Prison System. Applying the research to develop innovative designs beyond the prison itself, strategically modifying existing architectural and systematic standards with the goal of reducing incarceration and the risk of re-offending.
Kiera Tucker
Advisors: Veruska Vasconez (Primary), Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk (Secondary)
Embracing Roots, Shaping Spaces: Weaving Local Heritage into Contemporary Design
As the housing crisis continues, Syracuse, New York, historically shaped through transportation and manufacturing, faces a crucial moment of reassessment regarding its housing stock amid anticipated growth after decades of disinvestment. In its Southwest neighborhood, the pressing need to balance growth with community identity is evident. Significantly impacted by redlining and isolation due to an elevated highway, the area is experiencing a shift towards inclusive urban planning, aiming to restitch the community grid. However, with an anticipated population surge, especially in areas where vacant, less expensive land is prevalent, there is a significant threat to the neighborhood’s integrity.
The objective is to responsibly increase density while safeguarding the character of the community. The introduction of diverse residential types, selective infill, and master planning serve as an initiative towards achieving balance. In challenging conventional single-family zoning practices, the urban landscape is redefined to suit the evolving needs of the neighborhood. Through weaving community green spaces and pedestrian paths within every block, a network of interconnected programming is envisioned, fostering social cohesion and a sense of place. This vision is not simply a blueprint for physical structures, but a commitment to sustainable growth and the preservation of the social fabric that defines the Southwest neighborhood. By laying the groundwork for a resilient, vibrant, and inclusive environment residents of all backgrounds can thrive.
Alexa White
Advisors: Sophie Juneau (Primary), Jean-Francois Lejeune (Secondary)
Material Witness: Scripting the Recovery of the Donetsk Theater
"This project proposes an approach to designing in the context of Post-Conflict Reconstruction by specifically examining the Donetsk Academic Regional Drama Theater in Mariupol, Ukraine. This building sustained damage on March 16, 2022, due to the ongoing Russia-Ukraine Conflict. Its objective is to highlight the ruin as an active agent in both memorializing witness accounts and projecting reconstruction efforts into the future. In doing so, it emphasizes the importance of conservation of war-torn material forms as a means of honoring memory and facilitating recovery.”
Alexandra Wise
Advisors: Veruska Vasconez (Primary), Joanna Lombard/Samuel Goncalves (Secondary)
Beyond Speculation: Community-Centric Solutions for Housing, Trust, and Safety
The current housing crisis is caused by speculative real estate and further perpetuated by a legal system that criminalizes poverty and deepens inequalities. This thesis examines the potential of community land ownership and the repurposing of surplus government property assets as a transformative approach to addressing housing affordability challenges and investing in social capital. The findings from this research inform the conceptualization of a mixed-use housing complex situated on the grounds of the former Los Angeles Police Department headquarters and current detention and dispatch center. It investigates how architectural and urban design interventions can cultivate trust and promote social cohesion between law enforcement and the communities they serve by transforming surplus property into a vibrant campus of recreational, entrepreneurial, and educational spaces that supports a healthier, safer, and more affordable neighborhood. The intent of this research is not to provide a prescriptive pathway for police reform but to challenge the current uses of public land and services amid an affordability crisis.
Kevin Wright
Advisors: Maxwell Jarosz, Christopher Meyer
Biogenic Parts Kit
Thesis Statement: Create an affordable kit of environmentally healthy biogenic parts that allows low to middle income families build wealth by being able to develop land by purchasing only the minimum amount of space required to meet their program needs. With the option to easily expand when financial or spatial situations change.
Jacqueline Zuckerbrod
Advisors: Joachim Perez, Kevin Kirkwood
The Museum of Miami Beach diverges from conventional museolo
The Museum of Miami Beach diverges from conventional museological paradigms, presenting itself as an immersive architectural experience aimed at introspective engagement with the city's quintessential urban locale. Drawing inspiration from historical beachfront pavilions, this architectural intervention reinterprets these typologies as evocative totems, employing a nuanced interplay of materiality, form, and spatial organization to evoke memories and imagery intrinsic to Miami's coastal identity. These pavilions manifest in diverse manifestations, each meticulously crafted to articulate distinct narratives through architectural language. Composed of tactile materials reminiscent of beach paraphernalia, some pavilions evoke the leisurely ambiance of the shore, while others, fashioned from reclaimed debris, serve as poignant reminders of the environmental precarity besetting these coastal domains. Engaging with climatic dynamics, select pavilions harness solar exposure to choreograph captivating plays of light and shadow within their interiors, while others leverage natural ventilation strategies to imbue spaces with the sensory essence of the sea breeze. As bastions against inclement weather, these structures provide sanctuaries amidst the caprices of nature, enabling visitors to engage with the beachscape irrespective of atmospheric conditions. Yet, amidst this aesthetic reverie, a sobering reality emerges. Submerged pavilions serve as metaphorical markers, symbolizing the relentless encroachment of the sea upon the urban fabric. As harbingers of environmental vulnerability, these submerged structures underscore the existential threat posed by rising sea levels and climate change, prompting a profound reconsideration of the coastal urban condition. In this transient realm, visitors confront the ephemeral nature of Miami Beach's architectural landscape, catalyzing a discourse on the imperative of preservation and adaptive urban stewardship. By orchestrating immersive spatial experiences grounded in architectural poetics, the Museum of Miami Beach transcends its museological function, emerging as a crucible for critical reflection on the symbiotic relationship between architecture, ecology, and cultural identity.
