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WSOA In-Flux

WSOA In-Flux

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WSOA In-Flux is a publishing platform for student work launched by Woodbury School of Architecture in 2020.




Woodbury School of Architecture is distinguished by its multiple locations at the heart of the Southern California creative industries: Los Angeles, Hollywood and San Diego. Together, these sites form a critical infrastructure for architectural investigations.

Our undergraduate and graduate programs prepare students to effect positive change in the built environment, to tackle theoretical debates, and to take on architecture and interior design as critical practices. We educate our students as entrepreneurs, citizen architects, and cultural builders equally committed to professional practice, theoretical discourse, social equity and to formal and technological inquiry.

Our faculty are architects, designers, academics and policy makers practicing in Los Angeles, San Diego and Tijuana. This internationally recognized and award-winning group works closely with students to teach the skills required to push the limits of practice.



Mission

Good design is a human right. Woodbury School of Architecture produces graduates who affirm the power of design to improve the built environment and the lives of others by addressing the pressing issues of our time. We transform our students into ethical, articulate and innovative design professionals prepared to lead in a world of accelerating technological change.


Vision

The future belongs to Woodbury. Woodbury School of Architecture creates an environment that empowers our students to impact the future of the profession through meaningful built work. We imagine a world in which there are no disciplinary rights or wrongs, where diverse and sometimes contradictory values collide to generate new ideas, design innovation, unexpected practices, and the means to expand the influence of our discipline.


Woodbury School of Architecture offers a welcoming environment for students to develop their own unique design voice.  We approach the design disciplines multi-dimensionally, teaching a range of pedagogies and design methodologies. Our students leave Woodbury with the confidence to engage in local and global discourse.

Through engaged faculty-student interaction, we transform our students into innovative professionals with a commitment to the power of good design. Our students and faculty share a commitment to sustainable practices, community outreach and civic engagement.

Our School of Architecture is among the first 14 accredited architectural programs to be accepted for participation in the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB) Integrated Path to Architectural Licensure (IPAL) initiative. Successful students will have the opportunity to have an architectural license upon graduation.

We believe that our school is a role model for the direction in which the profession is heading – improving gender parity and ethnic diversity among its members, and reaffirming the importance of ethical conduct and social responsibility. Ours is a welcoming community for every race and orientation, and we resist acts of intolerance in favor of thoughtfulness, generosity and kindness. The economic, ethnic, and academic backgrounds of our students reflect Southern California itself. We are determined to provide a place for open debate, the respectful airing of differences, and for rich forms of expression and imagination.


Site running on Cargo. 




Home Now ︎ Graduate Studio Four


ARCH 589
Spring 2020 ︎
Los Angeles

Instructor
 Linda Taalman



Work by M.Arch student Maneh Tahmasian


The 2020 Comprehensive design studio takes on several specific challenges facing us now, the greatest being climate change and the impact that buildings have on their environment and the housing crisis and the ability for architects to provide solutions for the 100% not the 1%. Within this context, the comprehensive studio places particular emphasis on how to design and integrate technology and building systems within our building envelope, with the goal of creating spaces that are highly tuned to their climate, context and social needs. We will question the idea of home and domestic space and redefine how our individual spaces can make a positive impact on our shared communities.

Work by M.Arch student Mahzad Changalvaie


2020 is the year that California implements the first net zero energy code requirement at the residential scale, with the plan that by 2030 all buildings in California will be net zero. What this means is that our living spaces, many of which are planned piece by piece by the individual inhabitant, will lead the way towards a sustainable architecture that integrates energy performance with envelope efficiency at the highest level. Dwelling spaces have always played a critical role in the history of architecture, and particularly in California, with architects pioneering new technologies, materials and systems through the most essential space of the home. We will question both the idea of home and the role technology can play in defining how we live and how we build our spaces.




Work by M.Arch student Maneh Tahmasian


2020 is also a time of crisis for housing globally, and locally within the context of California which is facing a staggering number of homeless and a total lack of affordable housing at the rural, suburban and urban scale. We need fresh solutions. How can architects be a part of the future solutions for our residential spaces at all scales? We will rethink the idea of the house from the inhabitants needs as a 21st century citizen, what is the purpose of our home today? What is the definition of family, neighborhood, community? How do we want to live in the future?










Work by M.Arch student Xavier Chavez


Micro-housing
We will use the micro unit as a catalyst for big change. Starting with a single unit and the scale of the inhabitant the studio will innovate solutions for living, energy usage and generation, and material and resource management.  The unit will then be tested at a variety of scales- the rural, the suburban and the urban- and combinations- the single unit, the double and the multi.




Work by M.Arch student Cody Carpenter



Material Research & Prefabrication/Construction
Materials and methods of construction will be questioned as we strive to present new environmentally responsible and economical solutions for making space. One of the biggest inhibitors to housing is cost, and this studio strives to provide detailed solutions that are mindful of their environmental and economic feasibility. The studio will research methods of prefabrication, off site fabrication, and construction as a part of this questioning.


The studio explores the potential for architects to innovate within a highly defined building envelope. Students will develop designs for micro housing within the context of the Los Angeles region. The studio encourages architecture that retains its own identity while integrating and filtering its environment. There will be an integral focus on passive design and the interface between construction systems developed and environmental systems required for the functionality of the program and achieving net zero energy.



Catalog Description

Students are challenged to synthesize architectural considerations, from the conceptual to the tangible, in the comprehensive design of a building. The studio project grows from a strong theoretical base into a response to the complexities of program and site. Accessibility, environmental performance, and life safety are addressed.  Emphasis is placed on the integration of building systems with envelope and structure.  Material selection is guided by both climate and context and is sensitive to resource conservation.