In The Architecture of LSU, Desmond traces the university’s development and includes a wealth of photographs, plans, drawings, and maps that underscore the contributions of key historical figures as well as the genealogies of the campus’s architecture and planning. By meticulously detailing the origins and evolution of LSU’s architectural core and exploring the fundamentals of American college campus design, Desmond shows the far-reaching rewards of public environments that integrate natural and constructed elements to meet both practical and aesthetic goals.

Integral to the book’s creation, says Desmond, was the $180,000 Campus Heritage grant he and his colleagues received in 2006 from the Getty Foundation in Los Angeles.  “These grants were designed to help colleges and universities create historic preservation plans,” he says, adding that he was the principle investigator for the award, but he ended up with multiple collaborators across many disciplines at LSU. “The environment is inherently interdisciplinary,” Desmond says. “We all have a stake and we all have different kinds of expertise, interest and concern for the environment. It’s all overlapping and intertwined. It’s all necessary.”

Professors, retired professors, students and campus administrators alike helped with the effort, most notably including Landscape Architecture Professor Van Cox; Dr. Paul Hoffman, of the History Department; and recent College of Art + Design graduates Anthony Threatt, Santanu Majumdar, and Drew Wallace, among many others.

Desmond has taught architectural history and design for twenty-five years. An architect, he earned his Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, his master’s degree in architecture and urban design from Harvard University, and his bachelor’s degree in architecture from LSU.

Desmond will sign copies of the book on May 14 from 5-7 p.m. at Barnes & Noble on campus at LSU and on July 11 5-7 p.m. at the Old Governor’s Mansion hosted by the Foundation for Historical Louisiana.

For more information, contact Erin Rolfs at LSU Press/ 225.578.8282/erolfs@lsu.edu

The LSU Coastal Sustainability Studio (CSS), a trans-disciplinary program of the College of Art & Design, College of Engineering, and School of the Coast & Environment, has been awarded the prestigious Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture (ACSA) Collaborative Practice Award for 2012-13.

ACSA Board President Donna Robertson presented the award during the ACSA Annual Meeting on March 21-24 in San Francisco to Jeff Carney, CSS Director and Associate Professor of Architecture; Jori Erdman, Director and Professor of Architecture; Bradley Cantrell, Director and Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture; and Meredith Sattler, Assistant Professor of Architecture.

The ACSA Collaborative Practice Award recognizes university architecture programs and projects that demonstrate how faculty, students, and community clients can work together to realize common objectives. Participation by colleagues from other academic disciplines is encouraged.

“We are honored to be selected for the highly competitive ACSA Collaborative Practice Award,” said Carney. “This award is a significant measure of the ability for design to speak to a broader audience.”

CSS is unique in the nation in that it brings together disciplines that normally work separately so that it can respond to critical coastal issues in the most comprehensive way. Many previous coastal protection and restoration efforts have been engineering or science based, leaving out the human element. CSS offers a new paradigm, allowing designers such as architects, landscape architects, and city planners to have a voice in the process.

The studio, based in the Design Building, is based around the concept of “design thinking,” and design research projects are the primary focus. All CSS projects include faculty and students from architecture collaborating with other disciplines to address Louisiana’s coastal issues.

Erdman said, “I am very proud of the role the School of Architecture has played with the success of the Coastal Sustainability Studio. Through the CSS, our faculty have participated in research and outreach projects with engineers, photographers, landscape architects, and coastal scientists. The projects and the studio provide an excellent vehicle for the type of interdisciplinary and collaborative work that is celebrated with this award.”

Other CSS board members and faculty who participated but were unable to attend the award ceremony in San Francisco were:

• Robert Twilley – Director, Louisiana Sea Grant
• Lynne Carter – CSS Associate Director and Associate Director, Southern Climate Impacts Planning Program
• Elizabeth Mossop – Professor, Landscape Architecture
• John R. White – Associate Professor, Oceanography and Coastal Sciences
• Kristi Dykema Cheramie – Assistant Professor, Landscape Architecture
• Ursula Emery-McClure – Associate Professor, Architecture

The mission of ACSA is to advance architectural education through support of member schools, their faculty, and students.

For more information about the ASCA Collaborative Practice Award visit http://acsa-arch.org/programs-events/awards/2012-13-awards-press-release.

For more information about CSS visit www.css.lsu.edu.

The LSU School of Architecture cordially invites students and faculty to the…

2013 O.J. Baker Awards Ceremony & AIAS Silent Auction Fundraiser

Friday, April 26, 2013, at 4:30pm with awards announced at 5:00pm
LSU Sculpture Garden – Outside Atkinson Hall

The ceremony, which is named after the school’s first administrative head, O.J. Baker, recognizes LSU School of Architecture’s outstanding students with awards and scholarships. This event is presented by the Baton Rouge Chapter of the American Institute of Architects and the LSU School of Architecture.

Ford received his Bachelor of Architecture degree at Virginia Tech in 1985 and studied Biology and Life Sciences at LSU from 1993-1996. Ford’s most recent professional experience was as Vice President and Design Director at HKS USA, Inc in Atlanta. Prior to that he had worked in his own firm, Ford | Dickinson AAC, CSRS and Trahan Architects in Baton Rouge.

He joined the faculty of the LSU School of Architecture in 1996 as an adjunct instructor of studio and design theory courses. Students in the School of Architecture designated him as the 2004 Professor-of-the-Year. He left the School in 2006 to return to full-time practice.

Associate Professor Ursula Emery McClure, who frequently taught with Ford during his time at LSU had this to say about her former colleague. “Jack Ford brought an unlimited enthusiasm for the profession of architecture. Often active practitioners who teach use the studio as an escape from the difficulties of the real world. Jack never did. He loved the job, the craft, and the discipline and he made sure the students witnessed his passion. He was always fully engaged and there is no doubt in my mind that the students became engulfed in his love of building. Those students who were lucky enough to be taught by him will always love what they do.”

A memorial service will be held at 3:00 pm on Sunday, January 13th in the conference center on the 1st floor of Woman’s Hospital in Baton Rouge LA, 100 Woman’s Way (Airline Highway at Stumberg). The public is welcome to arrive at 2:30 pm to begin to celebrate and remember.

In lieu of flowers, Ford’s family has suggested that donations be made to the American Heart Association, the Alzheimer’s Association or the AIA Baton Rouge Education Fund.

The scanner, Creaform’s VIUScan, can capture surfaces, textures, and color from almost any existing object (a ceramic cup, for example) in a three dimensional model on the computer. The model can then be reproduced or scaled down, altered, and rendered utilizing software. Designs can then be produced through the corresponding fabrication unit in materials that include wood, steel, and plastic, among others. The fabrication unit, called a Computer Numeric Control Mill, is a Tormach PCNC 1100.

Students in the College are currently learning advanced visualization techniques digitally, and gaining experience in digital design fabrication with this equipment will prepare them for the technology that has become the future of many fields and is especially reshaping the competitive art and design industry. For class projects and research, students will produce detailed output of designs, digital representations, physical models, sculptures for learning, and artifacts for professional portfolios and college-wide assessment.

The Regents grant was written by Communication Across the Curriculum (CXC) Coordinator Vincent Cellucci in collaboration with Associate Dean of the College of Art +Design Tom Sofranko and Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture Bradley Cantrell. Multiple members of the College of Art and Design’s faculty, engaged with this technology, contributed to this grant as well.

LSU’s Communication across the Curriculum (CxC) is a university-wide program launched in 2004 to implement discipline- specific communication-intensive instruction into existing courses to improve student writing, speaking, visual, and technological communication skills. Rooted in the proven pedagogy of Writing across the Curriculum (WAC) programs, LSU’s CxC extends the WAC model to address spoken, visual, and technological communication to increase the marketability of student graduates in the professional workforce.

LSU College of Art + Design Distinguished Lecture Series Presents

Grace La

Principal, LA DALLMAN
Associate Professor, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

Wednesday, November 07 @ 4:30 p.m.
First floor lecture hall (room103) of the Art + Design Building
This presentation is sponsored by Coleman Partners Architects, LLC

LA DALLMAN was formed in 1999 in Milwaukee by Grace La and James Dallman and is engaged in the transformation of site through spatial and material investigations of diverse scale and type. An interest in volumetric nesting, material logic and fabrication precision is informed by contingencies of local craft, climate and geomorphology. Featured in the June 2012 Architect Magazine article exploring the fi rm’s design culture, LA DALLMAN has received over forty honors, including seven Design Awards from AIA Wisconsin, and prizes in international competitions. In 2011, LA DALLMAN was the fi rst American fi rm awarded the Spotlight: The Rice Design Alliance Prize, recognizing “exceptionally gifted architects in the early phase of their career.” LA DALLMAN was named a 2010 Emerging Voice by the Architectural League of New York, and received the 2007 Bruner Award for Urban Excellence Silver Medal. The fi rm’s work has won four Faculty Design Awards from the ACSA and Design Engineering awards from the national CRSI, the ASC-Wisconsin and the SEA-Illinois. LA DALLMAN is featured in publications by Architect Magazine, a+t, Architectural Record, Azure, Praxis, Topos, Princeton Architectural Press and Routledge. Grace has lectured widely, including at the Carnegie Museum of Art, the National Building Museum, the New Museum, and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston.

Grace La is tenured Associate Professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and has also taught design studios at the Harvard GSD, and Syracuse University. She received her M.Arch with thesis distinction from Harvard University Graduate School of Design, winning the Clifford Wong Housing Prize. She graduated A.B. magna cum laude from Harvard University in Visual and Environmental Studies.

For additional information visit: http://www.ladallman.com

The lecture is free, open to the public. Professional AIA and ASLA continuing education credit is available for this lecture.

If you are unable to attend, a recording of the lecture can be viewed at http://coadmediasite.lsu.edu/mediasite/Catalog/catalogs/default.aspx