I found this amazing course! The Architect in History: The Evolution of Practice from the Renaissance to the Present

Harvard Graduate School of Design: PRO 0741000

Fall 2013

Jay Wickersham

Location: Gund - Gropius Meeting Time: Wednesday, Friday 11:30am - 1:00pm

This course examines the history of architectural practice, focusing on the changing role and definition of the architect, with the goal of providing new perspectives on how we design and build today. The course begins in Renaissance Italy, moves through 17th- through 19th-century France and England, and then traces the evolution of practice in the United States from 1800 to the present. Major themes include: Changing models of architectural education, from the Beaux-Arts to modernism. Relationships with clients: How are building needs defined? How have architects made (or lost) money? How has government regulated the built environment? Relationship with the construction industry: Architects’ uses of technologies through history; their role relative to builders, as collaborators or adversaries. How have architects conveyed their design intent to clients and builders through drawings and models? Insiders and outsiders: Evolution of professional organizations and their gatekeeper role; the profession’s treatment of women and minorities. Relationship of architecture to other design professions: Engineering, landscape architecture, city planning, and interior design. Firms and individual creators: Professional myths and historical realities. The growth of big-firm practice, versus the branding and selling of the individual creator; the influence of critics and photographers on design. Class format will be a combination of lecture and discussion. Several classes will feature guest speakers. Readings will include original source materials (both written and graphic), and secondary interpretations. Course requirements will include a research paper, a final exam, and class participation. There is no prerequisite. All readings will be available on the course website.

The advent of the computer in our laboratories and studios has certainly made the shape and form of time amenable to human manipulation and intuition  in a way that as not been the case within rational disciplines since the dawn of the modern era; but without as board and historical an understanding of the time problem as possible, these exciting developments are at risk of falling into formalistic parody or mere embellishments and celebrations of market logic in firctionless freefall. 


Kwinter, S. (2001) Architecture of Time. Athens (Georgia): The MIT Press (Massachusetts Institute of Technology). From Preface.

Today I am compiling pictures of wearable instruments:

Mary Poppins one-man-band 1964

Chicks on Speed E-Shoe A High Heeled Shoe Guitar 2010

Björk's Alexander McQueen Bell dress 2004 

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Knowledge [Bulk]
Thinking [Action on Bulk]
Vision [Direction of Action]
Technique [Deployment of Vision]