“At Home with the Collective: A Seminar and Studio on the Future of Housing” received the 2025 AIA/ACSA Housing Design Education Award.
“It recognizes the importance of good education in housing design to produce architects ready for practice in a wide range of areas and able to be capable leaders and contributors to their communities.” The graduate research studio started with the following observation: escaping the pervasive models of profit-based home ownership seems increasingly difficult, while the urgency of the topic manifests in the lack of affordable housing in the US. Therefore, a seminar in Fall 2023 aimed at studying innovative housing schemes across the globe, engaging local communities, and learning from their struggle; and a studio in Spring 2024 developing new typologies of living for the American city. The insights from the seminar became instrumental for the studio as each student was able to design with a community in mind and advocated for better urban living in Chicago—a city with a particularly grim public housing history. Through surveys, focus groups, and workshops with affected communities, students developed projects for particular groups of marginalized people.
Recognition, congratulations, and credit goes to the following students at UIC Architecture and their projects: “Framing Reparations” by Obed Lopez, “The People’s Convent” by Andrew Spitzer, “Housing for the Single (but not isolated) Parent” by Armand Gamboa, “Take Care” by Coleman Little.”
Community engagement
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Research Catalog
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Coleman Little, “Take Care”
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Obed Lopez, “Framing Reparations”
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Andrew Spitzer “The People’s Convent”
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1:1 unit installation, Armand Gamboa, “Housing for the Single (but not isolated) Parent”