The College of Architecture's (COA) Master of Science (MS) Program is a non-professional program requiring a minimum of 30 semester hours of advanced study and is oriented toward advanced practice, scholarship and research. Applicants may have previous degrees in architecture or other related fields. The program accepts students with a professional degree in a design or design-related field, as well as students with a baccalaureate degree in a non-design field who wish to pursue an area of study offered in the Master of Science degree.

Concentration: Computation, Composition, and Construction

New developments in computer-aided design and manufacturing technologies are dramatically reshaping design thought and practice. The fast evolving digital design and digital production technology has deeply affected the way architects and designers work and collaborate with engineers; new forms and structures are being explored, the gap between design and production closes, complexity and standardization are dealt in new ways.

The Master of Science|Computation, Composition and Construction (MS|CCC) Program is founded upon these premises and is designed to explore these new interfaces of design thinking and making. The medium that founds and supports these links is computation: computer-controlled design algorithms visualize designs that would be difficult or even impossible to be thought and described otherwise. Similarly, computer-controlled fabrication machinery produces designs that would be very difficult to or even impossible to be produced otherwise.

Architectural romance with drawings or even traditional models is attacked on both fronts: drawings can not begin to capture the complexity of some of the digital designs and alternatively drawings may be forever uninformed and asymptote with specific discourses suggested by materials and technologies at hand.

The MS|CCC program provides an overview of these existing trends, critically reflects on the discourse produced and engages into research in these new trajectories. Currently, the areas of studies of the MS/CCC include formal models of composition, parametric modeling, shape grammars, building product models, design for fabrication and assembly, integration of design and construction, and Building Information Modeling. Application integration, for design improvement and optimization, dealing with structures, costs, energy usage are explored.

Specific requirements for this area of study may be found at the www.coa.gatech.edu/ms/ccc/.

For further details on the program, contact:

MS Program Advisor
PhD Office, College of Architecture
Georgia Institute of Technology
Atlanta, Georgia 30332-0155

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