Overview

The dual Master of Architecture I and Master of Urban Design degree is a 123 credit program (102 cr + 21 cr). The dual Master of Architecture I AP and Master of Urban Design degree is a 81 credit program (60 cr + 21 cr).

Master of Architecture I (3-year track)

The Master of Architecture I is a NAAB-accredited, 3-year (7 semester) program intended for students holding non-professional undergraduate degrees. This STEM-designated professional degree program provides a well-grounded understanding of architecture as students immerse in contemporary challenges to address a variety of social, cultural, technological and programmatic contexts.

At the heart of the M.Arch I curriculum are Core Studios that introduce students to critical topics, imbue necessary skills, inspire critical thinking, examine the production of meaning in architecture, and foster an understanding of architecture as an integrative discipline. The Core Studios are carefully synchronized with core courses in drawing and visualization, history and theory, technology and systems, and practice.

The first year of the program is an intensive introduction to the tools, conventions and agendas central to the discipline of architecture. The first two studios balance an exploration of form and function that will define the future of the profession, with a deep commitment to learning from architecture's past and present. The following summer, students participate in the Great Cities Design Studio. The Great Cities Design Studio uses design-based critical inquiry to address issues of site-specific design and infrastructure. This immersive travel-based studio provides ample opportunities for extensive student analysis and observation. Students will discover the layers of the City, combining archaeology and anthropology with architecture and history. Coursework emphasizes a critical assessment of the given site relative to questions of program, infrastructure, and cultural changes. 

During the second year, studios focus on the complex interrelationship of architectural problems across scales, from building details to global ecologies. Through design-based critical inquiry, students engage the many mandates of architectural design, including resilience, program, form, structural and environmental systems, building envelope, and urban context. The realities of the architectural profession are a consistent presence throughout the year, with practicing professionals incorporated into the studio context, and an emphasis on proficiency in technical documentation. 

Beyond the Core Studios, students are able to develop individual focuses, including computation and digital technologies, design-build, building construction, sustainability and resilience, urban design, historic preservation, adaptive-reuse, healthcare, or hospitality. Students direct this trajectory to match their own interests and career ambitions, allowing them to earn certificates in a professional concentration. This development is supported by a range of Upper Level Design Studios that reflect the diversity of faculty interests and experience, including those of internationally-recognized visiting scholars and fellows. The School is also home to innovative research units, including RAD-UM, Littoral Urbanism Lab, Community, Housing & Identity Lab, Center for Urban and Community Design and O Lab.

In their final year, graduate M.Arch students can opt to take an additional Upper Level Design Studio or pursue an Architecture Design Degree Project. The Architecture Design Degree Project takes one of three forms: 1) an individual design thesis on a topic selected and developed by the student through rigorous research, or 2) a directed design research group or 3) a Vertical Studio. Individual thesis is an opportunity for each student, working with a faculty advisor, to define an individual position with regard to the discipline of Architecture. In contrast, design research groups are led by faculty, and address relevant architectural questions through the lens of the faculty's areas of expertise. 

The M.Arch degree can also be combined efficiently with on-site post-professional degree programs, such as the Master of Urban Design and the Master of Real Estate Development and Urbanism.

Master of Architecture I AP (2-year advanced placement track)

The Master of Architecture I AP is a 2-year (4-semester program) for students holding a pre-professional degree in architecture or a closely-related field. This STEM-designated professional degree program provides an advanced platform for students to engage contemporary challenges and address a variety of social, cultural, technological and programmatic contexts.

This M.Arch I AP program allows students to advance their undergraduate education by engaging more complex challenges, honing their skills in essential areas, and by developing individual focus areas, for instance in advanced technology, design-build, and building construction, sustainability and resilience, urban design, historic preservation and adaptive-use, healthcare, or hospitality. Students direct their trajectory following their interests, develop areas of professional concentration through certificates, and engage in critical research.

Beyond the Core Studios, students are able to develop individual focuses, including computation and digital technologies, design-build, building construction, sustainability and resilience, urban design, historic preservation, adaptive-reuse, healthcare, or hospitality. Students direct this trajectory to match their own interests and career ambitions, allowing them to earn certificates in a professional concentration. This development is supported by a range of Upper Level Design Studios that reflect the diversity of faculty interests and experience, including those of internationally-recognized visiting scholars and fellows. The School is also home to innovative research units, including RAD-UM, Littoral Urbanism Lab, Community, Housing & Identity Lab, Center for Urban and Community Design and O Lab.

In their final year, graduate M.Arch students can opt to take an additional Upper Level Design Studio or pursue an Architecture Design Degree Project. The Architecture Design Degree Project takes one of three forms: 1) an individual design thesis on a topic selected and developed by the student through rigorous research, or 2) a directed design research group or 3) a Vertical Studio. Individual thesis is an opportunity for each student, working with a faculty advisor, to define an individual position with regard to the discipline of Architecture. In contrast, design research groups are led by faculty, and address relevant architectural questions through the lens of the faculty's areas of expertise. 

The M.Arch degree can also be combined efficiently with on-site post-professional degree programs, such as the Master of Urban Design or the Master of Real Estate Development and Urbanism.

Certificates

Graduate students increasingly look to areas of concentration that can provide skill and knowledge bases for professional applications. Historic Preservation, Classical and Traditional Design, Design for Health and Wellbeing, Sustainable and Resilient Design, Hospitality Design, Construction Management, Urban Design, and Real Estate Development prove to be rapidly growing areas of professional specialization as they engage critical areas of investigation in contemporary architecture. The certificate programs address both the intellectual and academic needs of the School of Architecture, and the desire of the School to use its current curriculum as a platform to engage these specialized areas further.

Certificates require 12-15 credits of one certificate-related studio (6 cr) and related architecture electives (9 cr).

Master of Urban Design

The Master in Urban Design, is a 36 credit, three (optional four) semester, STEM designated program that provides students with a vital design experience investigating the guiding principles for building regions, cities and communities. Reflecting the imperatives of sustainability and resilience, the program conceptualizes cities as an extension of the ecological transect across the natural to human habitat, providing students with a range of experiences from rural to urban. Studios and seminars engage the pressing contemporary challenges of housing, infrastructure, climate change, and health and wellness.

Program Director Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk, recognized for her foundational role in the development of the movement called the New Urbanism, leads the program that invites students to explore design, policy and management tools for place-making as a vehicle for improving quality of life in a variety of urban settings. The impact of the built environment on health, retrofitting the suburban landscape, real estate development as community building, adaptation to climate change, and urban growth and revitalization, are topics prominent in course offerings and faculty research.

The three-semester curriculum begins in the fall each year with foundation courses in urban design and real estate development, in an Interdisciplinary approach structured by environmental, social and economic goals. The spring semester intensifies students' engagement with contemporary urban challenges such as climate resilience, healthy community design, and repair of suburban sprawl. The summer semester provides a concluding experience that aggregates prior topics in an international setting that challenges goals of sustainability and resource conservation. As part of the curriculum, students participate in the National Charrette Institute certification course, a training in public outreach and participatory planning, and collaborate with real estate development students in two special projects: a national design and development competition, and a local community revitalization plan. These experiences and the course work shared with the Master of Real Estate Development and Urbanism program provide a focus on implementation. The optional fourth semester of the Master of Urban Design program is a semester-long independent study design project or thesis. In recent years these have focused on topics such as an analysis of principles and metrics of Smart Cities and New Urbanism, presentation of historic districts in China and post-pandemic design of public space.

Other resources that enrich the urban design student's experience in the School include the Center for Community and Urban Design (CUCD), engaging students in community outreach projects in South Florida and The Caribbean, and the Archive of the New Urbanism, housed in the School of Architecture Library. The Archive is a growing resource of documents, with both texts and images that support research related to urban design. Also, Research Affiliates from around the world join the faculty annually to study the state-of-the-art in urban design and architecture.

Guiding the ever evolving program are faculty members Charles Bohl, Jaime Correa, Eric Firley, Victor Deupi and Joanna Lombard, internationally recognized in research, publication and design.

While the Master of Urban Design is a post-professional program, structured for students with a professional degree in architecture, those holding a degree in engineering, planning or landscape architecture may apply for admission. A preparatory summer course may be required for non-architects, to be determined by the admission process.

Please refer to our website for the latest admission requirements. 

Curriculum Requirements  with MARCH I (3-Year Track)

ARC 601Urban Design Studio I6
ARC 603Urban Design Studio III6
ARC 604Immersive Architectural Design Studio I6
ARC 605Immersive Architectural Design Studio II6
ARC 606Great Cities Design Studio6
ARC 607Advanced Architectural Design Studio6
ARC 608Integrated Architecture Design Studio6
ARC 610Architecture Design Degree Project 6
ARC 611Spatial Representation + Architectural Media 13
ARC 613Spatial Representation + Architectural Media 23
ARC 620Responsible Architecture3
ARC 621Housing, Infrastructure and Transportation3
ARC 622Urban Design Theory and History of the Modern City3
ARC 630Building Technology: Materials and Methods3
ARC 632Structure Pt. I - The Form of Forces in Elements3
ARC 633Structure Pt. II - From Elements to Assemblies3
ARC 651Profiles in Practice3
ARC 652Management of Professional Practice3
ARC 653Urban Representation + Sketching1
ARC 662Environmental Building Systems I3
ARC 663Environmental Building Systems II3
ARC 667History of Architecture 3
ARC 668Diverse Histories of Architecture 20C. + Beyond3
ARC 690History of Cities3
ARC 691Analysis and History of Urban Form3
ARC 699Directed Research3
RED 601Introduction to Real Estate Development and Urbanism3
Technology & Systems Elective3
Electives17
Total Credit Hours123

Curriculum Requirements with MARCH I AP (2-Year Track) 

ARC 601Urban Design Studio I6
ARC 603Urban Design Studio III6
ARC 607Advanced Architectural Design Studio6
ARC 608Integrated Architecture Design Studio6
ARC 610Architecture Design Degree Project 6
ARC 615Advanced Architectural Media3
ARC 620Responsible Architecture3
ARC 621Housing, Infrastructure and Transportation3
ARC 622Urban Design Theory and History of the Modern City3
ARC 651Profiles in Practice3
ARC 652Management of Professional Practice3
ARC 663Environmental Building Systems II3
ARC 690History of Cities3
ARC 699Directed Research3
RED 601Introduction to Real Estate Development and Urbanism3
History of Architecture Elective3
Technology & Systems Elective3
Electives 15
Total Credit Hours81

Suggested Plan of Study with MARCH I (3-Year Track)

Plan of Study Grid
Fall ICredit Hours
ARC 604 Immersive Architectural Design Studio I 6
ARC 611 Spatial Representation + Architectural Media 1 3
ARC 620 Responsible Architecture 3
ARC 630 Building Technology: Materials and Methods 3
 Credit Hours15
Spring I
ARC 605 Immersive Architectural Design Studio II 6
ARC 613 Spatial Representation + Architectural Media 2 3
ARC 632 Structure Pt. I - The Form of Forces in Elements 3
ARC 667 History of Architecture 3
 Credit Hours15
Summer I
ARC 606 Great Cities Design Studio 6
ARC 653 Urban Representation + Sketching 1
ARC 691 Analysis and History of Urban Form 3
 Credit Hours10
Fall II
ARC 607 Advanced Architectural Design Studio 6
ARC 633 Structure Pt. II - From Elements to Assemblies 3
ARC 651 Profiles in Practice 3
ARC 662 Environmental Building Systems I 3
RED 601 Introduction to Real Estate Development and Urbanism 3
 Credit Hours18
Spring II
ARC 608 Integrated Architecture Design Studio 6
ARC 652 Management of Professional Practice 3
ARC 663 Environmental Building Systems II 3
ARC 668 Diverse Histories of Architecture 20C. + Beyond 3
Electives 2
 Credit Hours17
Summer II
Electives 9
 Credit Hours9
Fall III
ARC 601 Urban Design Studio I 6
ARC 621 Housing, Infrastructure and Transportation 3
ARC 690 History of Cities 3
ARC 699 Directed Research 3
 Credit Hours15
Spring III
ARC 610 Architecture Design Degree Project 6
ARC 622 Urban Design Theory and History of the Modern City 3
Technology & Systems Elective 3
Electives 6
 Credit Hours18
Summer III
ARC 603 Urban Design Studio III 6
 Credit Hours6
 Total Credit Hours123

Suggested Plan of Study with MARCH I AP (2-Year Track)

Plan of Study Grid
Fall ICredit Hours
ARC 607 Advanced Architectural Design Studio 6
ARC 615 Advanced Architectural Media 3
ARC 620 Responsible Architecture 3
ARC 651 Profiles in Practice 3
RED 601 Introduction to Real Estate Development and Urbanism 3
 Credit Hours18
Spring I
ARC 608 Integrated Architecture Design Studio 6
ARC 622 Urban Design Theory and History of the Modern City 3
ARC 652 Management of Professional Practice 3
ARC 663 Environmental Building Systems II 3
 Credit Hours15
Summer I
Electives 9
 Credit Hours9
Fall II
ARC 601 Urban Design Studio I 6
ARC 621 Housing, Infrastructure and Transportation 3
ARC 690 History of Cities 3
ARC 699 Directed Research 3
Technology & Systems Elective 3
 Credit Hours18
Spring II
ARC 610 Architecture Design Degree Project 6
History of Architecture Elective 3
Electives 6
 Credit Hours15
Summer II
ARC 603 Urban Design Studio III 6
 Credit Hours6
 Total Credit Hours81