VIRTUAL Prague Research & Teaching Conference

Abstract

Architectural education is commonly described as disconnected from the economic demands of the real world. Similarly, mainstream architectural practice is seen as lacking the imagination, creativity, and social agendas embedded in architectural education. Addressing this gap, this paper presents a studio approach that blends research-led design-studio teaching with ‘commercial’ realism. ‘Reprogramming the Corporate Office’ is a postgraduate design-studio at the Welsh School of Architecture, Cardiff University. The studio is specifically unique in purposefully engaging corporate entities as project clients—a domain that is frequently avoided in architectural education in the UK. Such engagement, however, comes from a proactive position that emphasises human-centred architectural ambitions and strong social and civic agendas. The studio examines the development of the corporate office as a cross-section of values and controversies associated with the corporate economic market, using this building typology as an opportunity to both critique and learn from corporate architecture and practices associated with it. Central to this approach is the use of design-fiction, storytelling, and cartoon techniques. Those tools were employed to document, understand and critique values, positions and theories associated with the students’ design/research topics and their chosen corporate clients. They also serve as a springboard for exploring exaggerated realities, relationships, and worldviews, inviting familiar and unfamiliar design scenarios for future corporate office buildings that can benefit not only its client but also its users and the wider community. Using examples from students’ work, the paper demonstrates how this studio approach creates new opportunities for productive critical practice in architectural education that facilitate the crossover between real-world demands and the creative imagination of architectural design education.