05-13-13

LECTURE: Marika Shioiri-Clark on Dignifying Design

Marika Shioiri-Clark, principal of SOSHL Studio, will speak at the CUDC on “Dignifying Design” as part of AIA Cleveland’s 2013 Emerging Practitioner Lecture Series. Based in Cleveland, SOSHL Studio is dedicated to creating social impact through architecture and design. In response to Denise Scott Brown’s comments on her exclusion from the Pritzker Prize, Marika recently co-authored a CNN.com article on the continuing discrimination of women in architecture.

Marika Shioiri-Clark | Dignifying Design
Friday, May 31, 2013
5:30pm
Kent State CUDC
1309 Euclid Avenue, Suite 200
RSVP on the Facebook event page here

From 2007 to 2010, Marika was Co-Founder and Managing Director of MASS Design Group, an architectural nonprofit designing well-built environments that aid in the reduction of global poverty. Marika was a lead designer on the Butaro Hospital project in northern Rwanda in collaboration with Partners in Health, the Clinton HIV/AIDS Initiative, and the Rwandan Ministry of Health, and lived on-site in 2008 developing the designs and overseeing construction.

Marika has received several awards for her work in reframing architects as global change agents. She was an invited Ideas Scholar at the Aspen Institute in 2009, and received a US National Commission for UNESCO Traveling Fellowship in 2008. Marika received her BA in Urban Studies from Brown University, and her Masters of Architecture from the Harvard Graduate School of Design, where her graduate thesis under advisors Jacques Herzog and Pierre DeMeuron focused on gendered public spaces in Cairo, Egypt. In 2011 she served in the first class of global residents at IDEO.org.

Watch Marika’s TEDxStellenbosch talk on Empathic Architecture:

The Emerging Practitioner Lecture Series is organized by AIA Cleveland’s Associates Committee in partnership with Kent State University’s Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative. Events are free and open to the public.

Questions can be directed to: angela.jayjack@gmail.com

04-28-13

2013 Capstone Final Review Schedule

We’re excited to announce the final review schedule for the 2013 Master of Urban Design capstone projects (see below). Graduate students at the CUDC enrolled in the Master of Urban Design or dual degree (Master of Architecture + Master of Urban Design) programs at the CUDC conclude their coursework with an individualized capstone project. Each capstone project is developed over two semesters, with the first semester focused on framing a research question and the second devoted to creating a design response. As can be seen from the project names below, the investigations span a wide range of topics and geographies.

The capstone presentations for this year’s class will be held at the CUDC (1309 Euclid Avenue, 2nd Floor) and are open to the public. If you are interested in pursuing a Master of Urban Design degree or just curious about one of the capstone topics, please feel free to attend any of the presentations. You don’t need to RSVP, but we ask that attendees arrive shortly before the designated start time. The presentation and discussion immediately following each project should run about an hour and a half. More information on the academic programs offered at the CUDC can be found on our website here. Contact us at cudc@kent.edu with any questions and we look forward to seeing you soon!

2013 Capstone Final Review Schedule:

4/30

10:00am
Antonia Marinucci | Erieview, Cleveland: Economic + Physical Reimagining
(Advisors: Charles Harker, Steve Rugare, Ellen Sullivan)

5/3

10:00am
Thom Nester | Public Space and the Effects of Digital Culture
(Advisors: David Jurca, Greg Stroh, Steve Rugare)

5/6

10:30am
Matt Provolt | TopoCity: Sheraden Neighborhood, Pittsburgh
(Advisors: Ellen Sullivan, Charles Graves, Sagree Sharma)

1:00pm
Brandon Young | Revising Richard Florida: Creative/Productive Space for Cleveland
(Advisors: Diane Davis-Sikora, Jonathan Kurtz, Terry Schwarz)

5/7

9:00am
Sarah Myers | From Waste to Pop Up: a Temporary Diversion from the Landfill
(Advisors: Jonathan Fleming, Charles Frederick, Terry Schwarz)

10:30am
Gabriel Fey | New Futures for the Infrastructural City
(Advisors: Steve Rugare, Jonathan Fleming, Jonathan Kurtz, Jacqueline Mills)

1:00pm
Troy Eklum | Transit Based Metropolitan Master Planning: Developing a Large Scale Strategy for Growth and Mobility Patterning
(Advisors: Ellen Sullivan, Charles Frederick, Steve Rugare)

5/8

1:00pm
Arthur Schmidt | Beyond Complete Streets: a Methodology for Designing a Complete Urban Street System
(Advisors: Steve Rugare, Jeff Kruth, Stephanie Ryberg-Webster, Daniel Vieyra)

5/9

3:30pm
Tommy Chesnes | Neighborhood Tuning: Waterloo Arts District, Cleveland
(Advisors: Terry Schwarz, Wayne Mortensen, Ellen Sullivan)

Download PDF: 2013 Capstone Final Review Schedule

04-19-13

Call for Abstracts | COLDSCAPES Urban Infill Volume 6 | Due May 31, 2013

Call for Abstracts : Improving livability in cold climate cities

Kent State University’s Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative (CUDC) invites writers, designers, artists and thinkers to submit abstracts for Volume 6 of our annual publication, Urban Infill. Urban Infill examines themes in contemporary urban design, architecture, and planning. Past volumes have addressed shrinking cities, temporary urbanism, urban hydrology, storytelling, and diagramming in an urban context. These can be previewed here: (www.cudc.kent.edu/publications/urban_infill/index.html)

Volume 6 is part of the CUDC’s 2013 launch of the Center for Outdoor Living Design (COLD), which is dedicated to improving livability in cold weather cities (www.coldscapes.org). We invite examples and perspectives that challenge common perceptions of cold urban environments and reveal the unique design opportunities that winter cities present. Writings and projects may span across various disciplines, including architecture, landscape architecture, and urban design. We are particularly interested in submissions that correspond to any of these five (5) themes:

CONCEPTUALIZATION
(historical / theoretical framework for understanding the winter experience in cities)

REPRESENTATION
(visualizations and multi-sensory communication techniques that evoke the atmospheric conditions and ephemerality of the winter season)

EXPERIENCE OF VULNERABLE POPULATIONS
(responses to the needs of homeless individuals and immigrants during winter weather conditions)

BUILT CASE STUDIES
(examples of successful constructed architectural or urban design projects in cold climates)

FUTURE WINTERS
(unbuilt projects and evocative possibilities for winter cities of the future)

Submission Requirements:
Abstract / Description (text) : 500 words or less
Images: no more than 5 thumbnails - total file size under 10MBs.
Please send abstracts and/or images via email to cudc@kent.edu no later than Friday, May 31st 2013. We welcome new, in-progress or pre-published, original work.

Relevant Dates:

• Abstracts due: Friday, May 31st 2013
• Notification to selected contributors: Friday, June 7th 2013
• Final entries due: Friday, July 19th 2013
• Expected publication: November 2013

Download Call for Abstracts PDF

Please feel free to share with your friends and networks!

- CUDC

04-16-13

LECTURE: The Professional Guide to Green Roofs with Co-Author Lisa Lee Benjamin

Lisa Lee Benjamin is a catalyst for the planet profoundly dedicated to altering the way we live. With a botanical background, her work focuses on international collaboration to open possibilities and challenge our ideas of sustainability and community. She has led and consulted on projects from California to Kenya.

Her new book, The Professional Guide to Green Roofs, is a collaborative venture with designers to aid practitioners in green roof design. Come hear her speak about vegetative roofs in our changing world.

12 - 1pm
Friday, April 19th, 2013
CUDC 1309 Euclid Ave., Suite 200
Free and open to the public
Directions

Lisa will also speak on the Kent State main campus the same day at 3:40pm in Rm 202 Taylor Hall.

04-01-13

CUDC Launches Center for Outdoor Living Design (COLD) & COLDSCAPES Competition

We’re very excited to announce our new winter weather-related initiative, the Center for Outdoor Living Design, which conveniently forms the acronym COLD. The project is intended to encourage designers of various disciplines to engage more creatively with the opportunities presented by winter weather urban environments.

Representations and design strategies in architecture and urban design are often dominated by idealized imagery from warmer seasons, marginalizing the unique design opportunities that winter weather cities present. As a result, creative approaches to improving urban livability during winter are left unexplored, reinforcing common perceptions that public life can’t survive outdoors for much of the year (ahem…skywalks).

The first of this year’s COLD activities is the launch of COLDSCAPES: New Visions for Cold Weather Cities, a multi-disciplinary design competition intended to gather compelling ideas for revitalizing cold climate urban places. Submissions from the competition and other projects gathered by COLD will comprise a growing online archive of images and videos to inspire designers, city officials, and interested members of the public to embrace their city’s winter identity.

A jury of artists and designers familiar with cold weather design issues will select three thought-provoking and visually compelling submissions, each to receive a $1,000 award. A larger set of submissions will receive honorable mentions and the opportunity to be included in an exhibition and published in this year’s Urban Infill journal. To learn more about COLD and to register for the COLDSCAPES competition, please visit our website at www.coldscapes.org.

Competition timeline:
April 1, 2013 - Competition Announced
May 24, 2013 - Registration Deadline
July 12, 2013 - (6pm EST) Submission Deadline
July 26, 2013 - Competition Winners Announced

Competition jury:
Shane Coen, Founder and Principal at Coen+Partners | Minneapolis, Minnesota
Gary Toth, Director of Transportation Initiatives at Project for Public Spaces | New York City, New York
Aase Kari Mortensen, Senior Architect at Snøhetta | Oslo, Norway
Greg Peckham, Managing Director at LAND Studio | Cleveland, Ohio
Patrick Coleman, CEO at The Winter Cities Institute | Anchorage, Alaska

As Spock would often say during winter, “Live Cold and Prosper!”

The 2013 series of COLD activities is made possible through the generous support of Cuyahoga Arts & Culture and The Cleveland Foundation.

03-25-13

Bellwether

Discussion with Terry Schwarz and Corine Vermeulen
Thursday, April 11th, 7 p.m. at the Transformer Station.

Terry Schwarz, director of Kent State University’s Urban Design Collaborative, and photographer Corine Vermeulen will lead a discussion about their work and shared interest in art’s role as a catalyst for improving and enriching the urban landscape.

Corine Vermeulen photographed the citizens and landscape of Detroit in her 2005 project, Your Town Tomorrow. Recently, she contributed to thanks for the view, mr. mies: layfayette park, detroit, a volume of interviews and photographs about life in the largest collection of Mies van der Rohe buildings in the world. She says, “Detroit represents a unique and great vehicle for change where old structures are no longer in place and the possibilities of something different to happen are endless.”

Terry Schwarz launched the CUDC’s Shrinking Cities Institute in 2005 to address the implications of population decline and large-scale urban vacancy in Northeast Ohio. She established Pop Up City, a temporary use initiative for vacant and underutilized sites in Cleveland.

Bellwether is an open-ended series of discussions and events that aims to discover the possibilities and limitations of art as a transformative tool in the city of Cleveland. Bellwether is a project of the Contemporary Art Society of the Cleveland Museum of Art.
http://bellwether.clevelandart.org/

03-22-13

Open Urban Designer Position at CUDC

Hello friends and colleagues! The Kent State Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative is currently looking to fill an Urban Designer position recently made available on our staff. The position’s responsibilities include project management, a commitment to working with community groups and an interest in Urban Design education.

The candidate should hold an advanced degree in Architecture, Landscape Architecture or Planning, and have five or more years of experience in Urban Design or a related field. The salary is negotiable based on the applicant’s experience.

Here’s how to access a full description of the available position and online application:

1. Visit Kent State’s career postings site

2. Click the Search Postings link on the left sidebar

3. Enter position number: 998196

We plan to fill the position in April, so please feel free to spread the word!

01-09-13

Apocalypse Town: Tales from the End of an Urban Civilization

Italian researcher Alessandro Coppolo will be presenting a lecture about his impressions of Cleveland and his findings about shrinking cities in the US and Europe at CSU’s Levin College Forum on Tuesday, January 15. The event is free and open to the public.  Details here:

http://blog.cleveland.com/architecture/2013/01/italian_author_alessandro_copp.html#incart_river_default

11-05-12

Just Released…Urban Infill Vol 5: Diagrammatically

* Order Diagrammatically from the CUDC Amazon storefront here.

The 2012 volume of Urban Infill is now available through Kent State’s Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative, local book stores, and Amazon. UI5: Diagrammatically applies the techniques of diagramming to urban design practice through critical essays, case studies, and examples. Over twenty contributors from the US and Europe discuss the ways that urban diagrams engage the public, reveal hidden agendas, and navigate uncertainty. The book features innovative and thought-provoking examples of urban diagramming, presented in a lively, full-color format.

A few examples of the work included in the book:

‘Re-cultivating the Forest City‘ is a must-read for Clevelanders. A design proposal developed by PORT Architecture + Urbanism, this series of diagrams and renderings offers a seductive glimpse at Cleveland’s future where urban vacancy leads to economic productivity, ecological regeneration, and increased public use of the Cuyahoga Valley.

‘Thinking + Talking Adaptability,’ a series of diagrams created by the Adaptable Futures project at Loughborough University in the UK, provides a toolbox of diagrams that communicate sustainable values and highlight aspects of building performance. This work is useful to designers and lay audiences alike, and provides the basis for a shared understanding of the components of sustainable design.

‘Strategrams‘ by Susan Rogers at the Community Design Resource Center in Houston and ‘Empowerpoint‘ by Interface Studio in Philadelphia present diagramming strategies in the context of community design practice.

‘Through the Diagram…‘ by Kent State University faculty member Greg Stroh showcases recent work from the graduate studios at the College of Architecture and Environmental Design.

Diagrammatically will be of interest to architecture and planning students, urban design practitioners, and anyone interested in better, more livable cities.

Get your copy of Diagrammatically today: CUDC Amazon Store.

For more information about the Urban Infill journal series, please contact the CUDC at: cudc[AT]kent.edu

06-26-12

Postcard Underground Sends Their Love To Pop Up Rockwell

Over the past week, we’ve received at least eight handwritten postcards thanking us for Pop Up Rockwell. When we received the first one, written on an art gallery postcard, we figured it was from someone interested in promoting an upcoming art opening and just happened to hear about our project. After three cards arrived the next day, written in different hands, it was clear something else was going on.

06-04-12

UPDATE: Diagram Book - Call for Abstracts Deadline Extended!

We’ve extended the deadline to submit abstracts for our upcoming Urban Infill publication focused on Diagramming in Urban Design. Abstracts for this fifth volume of Urban Infill will be accepted until Friday, June 15th, 2012. Submissions should be emailed to cudc@kent.edu.

We invite writers, designers, artists and thinkers to submit abstracts, which include examples and perspectives on diagramming and its place in urban design practice and processes. We are particularly interested in the intents and agendas behind various forms of diagramming within the following framework. Submissions may correspond to any of these six (6) themes:

DEFINING THE DIAGRAM
(historical / theoretical evolution of diagramming, diagramming in design thinking and processes,
conventional and unconventional approaches to diagramming in / for urban design)

MEANING | FUNCTION
(diagrams as a way to represent meaning; to clarify / communicate with accuracy and specificity)

TRANSLATION | INTERPRETATION
(diagrams used to reveal, explore, analyze and represent information and ideas)

VAGUENESS | SUGGESTION
(diagrams used to hint, suggest, obfuscate, subvert, conceal or lie)

COMPOSITION | NARRATIVE
(diagrams that simulate and present composite perspectives, juxtapositions of ideas and objects, and
communicate processes and narratives)

EXCHANGE | ENGAGEMENT
(diagram as process and tool for engagement)
Submission Requirements:

Abstract / Description (text) : 500 words or less
Images: no more than 5 thumbnails - total file size under 5MB.

Please send abstracts and/or images via email to cudc@kent.edu no later than Friday, June 15th 2012. We welcome new, in-progress or pre-published, original work.

Relevant Dates:
Abstracts due: Friday, June 15th 2012
Notification to selected contributors: Monday, June 22nd 2012
Final entries due: Friday, July 27th 2012
Expected publication: September 2012

05-21-12

Call for Submissions

The CUDC invites writers, designers, artists and thinkers to submit abstracts for Volume 5 of our annual publication, Urban Infill. Urban Infill examines themes in contemporary urban design, architecture, and planning. Past volumes have addressed shrinking cities, temporary urbanism, urban hydrology, and storytelling in an urban context. These can be previewed here:(http://www.cudc.kent.edu/publications/urban_infill/index.html)

Volume 5 will focus on diagrams. We invite examples and perspectives on diagramming and its place in urban design practice and processes. We are particularly interested in the intents and agendas behind various forms of diagramming within the following framework. Submissions may correspond to any of these six (6) themes:

DEFINING THE DIAGRAM
(historical / theoretical evolution of diagramming, diagramming in design thinking and processes,
conventional and unconventional approaches to diagramming in / for urban design)

MEANING | FUNCTION
(diagrams as a way to represent meaning; to clarify / communicate with accuracy and specificity)

TRANSLATION | INTERPRETATION
(diagrams used to reveal, explore, analyze and represent information and ideas)

VAGUENESS | SUGGESTION
(diagrams used to hint, suggest, obfuscate, subvert, conceal or lie)

COMPOSITION | NARRATIVE
(diagrams that simulate and present composite perspectives, juxtapositions of ideas and objects, and
communicate processes and narratives)

EXCHANGE | ENGAGEMENT
(diagram as process and tool for engagement)
Submission Requirements:

Abstract / Description (text) : 500 words or less
Images: no more than 5 thumbnails - total file size under 5MBs.

Please send abstracts and/or images via email to cudc@kent.edu no later than Friday, June 8th 2012. We welcome new, in-progress or pre-published, original work.

Relevant Dates:
Abstracts due: Friday, June 8th 2012
Notification to selected contributors: Monday, June 18th 2012
Final entries due: Friday, July 27th 2012
Expected publication: September 2012

03-11-12

Full Video + Slides from Susannah Drake’s dlandstudio Lecture

Thanks to everyone that attended Susannah Drake’s presentation at the CUDC. If you were in the audience, then we’re sure you found her dlandstudio projects to be as creative and inspiring as we did. Fortunately, for those unable to attend the presentation, we have the full video available online. The 1 hour 18 minute presentation is divided into 3 parts, including introductory remarks from CUDC Director Terry Schwarz and updates on the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District’s green infrastructure plans from Kyle Dreyfuss-Wells, followed by Susannah Drake’s detailed presentation of several public projects ranging from city-wide infrastructure plans to temporary pop-up parks. Enjoy!

02-26-12

Susannah Drake Lecture 3/2/12

Susannah Drake Lecture
Friday, March 2, 2012
8:30 AM - 10:30 AM
CUDC Conference Room
1309 Euclid Ave., Suite 200
Cleveland - PlayhouseSquare

Susannah Drake is founder and Principal of dlandstudio llc, an award winning multidisciplinary design firm. She will discuss dlandstudio’s recent public projects including the Gowanus Canal Sponge Park, a public open space system designed to absorb and remediate urban storm water, and the Brooklyn Bridge Pop-up Park, a temporary waterfront open space that attracted almost 200,000 visitors over six weeks of operation in 2008.

This event is free, but reservations are required. RSVP for the event on our Facebook page here, by email at cudc@kent.edu or give us a call at (216) 357-3434.

Continuing Education credits are available for landscape architects.

Sponsored by The George Gund Foundation, the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District, and the Kent State College of Architecture and Environmental Design.

02-09-12

CUDC Temporary Staff Position

The CUDC is looking for a temporary staff member to manage our books and answer the phones for a couple of months, starting in late February. If you’re interested, go to the KSU job site and search for position 003777. https://jobs.kent.edu/applicants/jsp/shared/frameset/Frameset.jsp?time=1328724047456

For additional information, please contact the CUDC at 216.357.3434 or cudc@kent.edu.