Bedford Seminar
Abroad & Off-Campus Programs
Bedford Seminar
The Bedford Architecture/Engineering initiatives aims to create meaningful cross-disciplinary experiences that address the increasing complexity and rising expectations for building performance and design. Under the direction of a visiting professorship designed to engage accomplished engineers with records of effective collaboration, there are three initiatives: 1) an upper-level interdisciplinary design studio, 2) an upper-level interdisciplinary seminar, and 3) an international traveling workshop.
Bedford A/E Interdisciplinary Studio: By teaming upper-level architecture and engineering students together on a building design project, the studio is structured to raise awareness of the diverse responsibilities and agendas of architects and engineers, develop an understanding of disciplinary language, and create an appreciation for the value of interdisciplinary input in the early design phases.
Bedford Seminar: This cross-listed interdisciplinary seminar exposes participants to progressive historic and contemporary building projects that rely heavily on cross-disciplinary integration. In addition to exposing students to best practices through a variety of structural typologies, an interdisciplinary design component requires creative collaborative interdisciplinary engagement.
Bedford Traveling Workshop: This international workshop sponsors the travel of six architecture students and six engineering students to locations where concentrations of best practices and projects can be found. The workshops include seminars in the offices of accomplished architecture and engineering practices, visits to acclaimed architectural projects, construction site visits led by the project’s architects and/or engineers, and a collaborative design exercise structured to catalyze interdisciplinary discourse. Recent workshops include Sydney/Melbourne (2012), Hamburg/Berlin (2011), and Shanghai/Shenzhen/Hong Kong (2010).
The Bedford initiatives are effective in promoting interdisciplinary discourse between the Schools of Engineering and Architecture. They result in new minors and co-terminal degree options for architecture students while shaping the structural engineering track, with a focus on architectural projects as a distinction of the program.
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