An Attempt to Fill the Gap between the Architectural Studies and Conceptualization in Architectural Thesis Design Studio

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the application of a theoretical framework in the architecture thesis project to discover the effectiveness of the exercise on the thesis projects. It was common to observe that the students prepared the architectural thesis project with limited, unstructured, or disconnected studies to analysis, programming, and conceptualization phases. A theoretical framework model was tested to evaluate the effects on the learning outcomes of the students. The methodology of the research was designed based on structured observation and content analysis. The findings of the research reveal that the students perceive and understand the studies and the theoretical framework differently. The students demonstrated their theoretical framework with four categorical specifications including information, application, presentation, and communication. The information referred to data and structure of the organization, the application implied the relation between the data collection, analysis and other phases of the thesis project, the presentation illustrated how they applied graphical tools to illustrate the data, and communication revealed the interaction between the students and the panel of juries and participants. In conclusion, the theoretical framework connects the studies to the concept generation and opens a new door for the discussion of the architectural studies and lessons learnt between the panel of juries, the students, and peers. For an effective expectation from the theoretical framework outputs, detailed guidelines could harmonize the students’ outputs due to the varieties of the application, interpretation, and demonstration of the architectural theoretical frameworks.

Disaster Awareness and Education Center-Park Design: Investigation of Outdoor Spaces on Graduation Project of Architecture Students

“…On graduation projects, Tafahomi (2021a) wrote that this latest architectural project estimates the graduate candidate's general knowledge, skills, research, and problem-solving skills in architecture and related fields. Studies have found that students have four characteristics: knowledge, practice, presentation, and communication to develop the theoretical framework in their graduation projects (Tafahomi, 2021b). In the spring semester of the 2020-2021 academic year, the fieldwork graduation project was conducted online using technological devices under pandemic conditions.…”

Thesis Supervisory Panels as the New Design Studio Paradigm in UTM Master of Architecture Programme

“…Students are also required to present their works covering the objectives, studies and theoretical framework on top of the design project. This is critical in order to demonstrate understanding of a complete scheme from ideation to execution (Tafahomi, 2021). As the school aspires to expand its size, more panels need to be opened to accommodate larger student population.…”

Developing a Design Framework to Methodize the Architecture Thesis Projects with Emphasis on Programming and Conceptualization Processes

“…The conceptual design and development in architecture have been a hot and great topic for (AIA, 2009;RIBA, 2014;Schon, 1984;Tafahomi, 2021a;2021b). The engineering literature emphasized two stages for the design of a product importantly planning for design and conceptualization for design (Pena & Parshall, 2012) that the first task involved design tasks and the second task refers to materializing of the product.…”

“…The final project of the students is supposed to carry out the education experience including knowledge, skill, and ability to represent the level of the quality of design decisions by the students (DoA, 2012;FAED, 2009). Despite the confusion between the theoretical framework and the conceptual framework, seemingly, the theoretical framework refers to the studies based on the theoretical topics and outputs however; the conceptual framework refers to the research outputs and the synthesis (Tafahomi, 2021b). The studies indicate that achieving the design framework or conceptual framework is significant in the conceptualization process of the final project (Borden & Ray, 2006;Ghonim & Eweda, 2019).…”

“…In detail, the students from the topic have a straightforward movement toward the programming and conceptualization for the design of the project. However, the students are less successful to present the lessons learnt through studies and the architectural findings in the analysis stages (Tafahomi, 2021b). Seemingly, the design outputs of the students could represent a weak connection between the architectural findings and the final outputs.…”