Architecture Sat May 31 2008

Booth to head new Northwestern Architecture Program

The Daily Northwestern is reporting that Laurence Booth will be the university's first "Distinguished Architect in Residence" as the school seeks to establish its new undergraduate architecture program. In addition to Booth, several other current NU professors will offer classes in architecture history, design, and engineering. The new program will be under the auspices of the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science as further detailed in the school's magazine.

Demand for an architecture program was the main motivator for the university. The chair of the engineering school's advisory board, Richard Halpern explains, "Very often we see good prospective students, who we’d like to have come here, but they’d like an architectural component. We think we may have lost some students because we didn’t offer such a program." Halpern's involvement with the program extends beyond advisory to benefactor. As cofounder of the construction consulting firm RISE International, Halpern and his wife Madeline generously donated to help jump-start this field of study.

There is no word yet as to whether Northwestern will seek NAAB accreditation (National Architecture Accreditation Board) or if the ultimate goal of the program is to offer the Master of Architecture degree. The current goal of the program will be to prepare architecture students to continue their education elsewhere at the graduate level, to attain the Master's degree necessary for licensure.

Tapping Booth (who, somewhat ironically, is at the center of controversy in Evanston for the planned tower at Fountain Square) as a resource almost immediately helps give the program some legitimacy among the area's other prolific architecture schools. Hopefully, the program at Northwestern will flourish, increasing Chicago as a destination, not only to view great works of architecture, but for the education of an architect, as well.

— Carl Giometti / Comments (0)