Course Syllabus
Professor: Dr. Shenglin Chang shenglin@umd.edu
Phone: 301-405-4369
Office hour: 5:00-6:00 PM. Monday - Thursday
| TA: Xiao Zheng (M/W) | zhxiao88@yahoo.com |
| Charles Hope (T/Th) | hopelarc@hotmail.com ; SaraNye@aol.com |
Design is a discipline common to many professional fields. It is a process that utilizes visual and cognitive images to make an understandable, meaningful, and functional whole from separate parts. For most of you, landscape architectural design is a new endeavor which will involve you in the process of learning a new language and developing new ways of “communicate” with the world around you in order to synthesize a creative process in the shaping visualizing of 3-dimensional space.
When you are learning the new language, you should find the balance between the intuition and the rational vocabularies. Ordinary language, within the design process, is useful in the development of your design vocabularies. You have the choice of accepting and rejecting any of the expert design languages, then, develop your own solutions.
The studio course will explore the fundamental qualities of spatial design and the terminology particular to exploring design issues. A variety of skills, techniques, and strategies will be used to isolate issues and solve 3-dimensional problems as they relate to landscape architecture.
Emphasis will be placed on design thinking. This course will expand the subject matter covered in LARC 160: Introduction to Landscape Architecture and apply it to the solving of landscape architecture design problems in a studio setting. The student will begin to explore and develop design skills. Students will also apply the graphic skills that you learned from LARC 140 and LARC 120 to represent your designs. Students entering the course are required to have an introductory-level understanding of the profession and an ability to express ideas graphically. The objectives of this course are:
Develop an understanding of the creative problem solving process used in landscape architectural practice and to apply the creative process to solving landscape architectural design problems.
Become acquainted with the basic elements and principles of design organization and explore their application to the design of outdoor spaces.
Increase your awareness and appreciation of designed outdoor spaces, learn to recognize the character purpose of landscape spaces, and to evaluate the success or failure.
Learn how to create outdoor spaces that show an understanding or and response to human needs and ecological systems.
Begin to develop a design ethic that recognizes the meaning and symbolism of the landscape so that your designs have spiritual and philosophical content as well as aesthetic and functional ones.
This course meets twice a week for a total of six hours. Scheduled class time is Monday/ Wednesday and Tuesday /Thursday from 2:00 to 4:50 p.m. The course will be taught in a studio/lecture format with lectures typically occurring at the beginning of the studio period. A large part of your learning experience will occur from personal critiques and through the exchange of ideas with your classmates, the instructor and visiting critics.
Course work will consist of individual and group projects, a design journal, reading assignments and in-class exercises. In-class exercises are assigned a √-, √, or √+ and are considered part of your class participation grade. Design projects will usually be presented in class and therefore must be completed on time. Late work is strongly discouraged and will be penalized 1/2 grade each day it is late. Failure to present a design project will result in a F grade for all aspects of the project.
You must attend class, participated in discussions and be open to feedback as part of the design process. If you miss more than 2 studio sessions without a valid, approved excuse, your final grade will be reduced.
The course schedule indicates readings that have been selected from the required and recommended textbooks. These are intended to supplement the studio and field experience. In order to gain the most from the studio work and field observations, you should complete the readings before coming to class.
REQUIRED TEXTS: (also available at Amazon.com)
Bloomer Kent; Charles Moore. 1977. Body, Memory and Architecture. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Christopher Alexander et al. 1977. A Pattern Language. New York: Oxford University Press.
Reid, Grant W. 1993. From Concept to Form in Landscape Design. New York: Wiley and Sons.
SUPPLEMENTAL READINGS:
Bell, Simon. Elements of Visual Design in the Landscape. 1996. (LARC 120)
Ching, Francis D.K. Architecture Form, Space and Order. New York: Wiley and Sons. 1996.(available at the Amazon.com).
Tentative Schedule (Detail refer to assignment sheets):
Project I (10%): While Mind Dances with Heart
Week 1 to Week 3 (Presentation: 9/17, 9/18)
Reading: Body, Memory, and Architecture.
Project II (15%): Shaping Landscape from Metaphor
Week 4 to Week 6 (Presentation: 10/8, 10/9)
Reading: From Concept to Form in Landscape Design
Project III (25%): Hornbake Landscape Theater
Week 7 to Week 9 (Presentation: 10/29, 10/30)
Reading: TBA
Project IV (40%): Design With People in Mind
Week 10 to Week 14 (Presentation: 12/3, 12/4)
Reading: A Pattern Language
Project V (10%): 11X17 portfolio (2 projects, each with 2 pages)
Turn in: 12/8, 12/9