Architectural environment effects work produced
How important is the space you’re working in? Kate Schwennsen thinks it matters a lot.
Schwennsen, chairwoman of Clemson University’s School of Architecture and former president of the American Institute of Architects, said that as the buildings have changed, the students’ work has, too.
And the building has changed plenty in the 100 years Clemson — the only school in South Carolina offering architecture — has taught the program, she told a gathering of the Columbia Design League on Tuesday.
It spent decades in the brick, Italian villa-inspired Riggs Hall. At the time, it had a bold design which allowed for few flourishes, when architecture stressed utility, Schwennsen said.
So when students in 1958 moved into the first Lee Hall — a mid-century modern design, emphasizing minimalism and openness — their environment changed completely.
While showing students’ projects from shortly after the move, Schwennsen said the influence was evident.
A plan for a Hilton Head Island marina, drawn in 1958, mimics Lee Hall, with clean lines and lots of windows. A student’s 1962 plan for a Catholic church in Easley put aside conservatism for sharp angles and geometric design. The students themselves became a looser, edgier group.
This is in part due to the fact that the students’ environment isn’t homogeneous, Schwennsen said.
Instead, the architecture school has established programs in Genoa, Italy; Barcelona, Spain and Charleston. Genoa was the first program, established in 1973. It was opened because South Carolina didn’t offer a place for students to see much urban design.
“We need to graduate students who are good global citizens,” Schwennsen said.
The school’s building changed again last year, when Clemson opened Lee III, an addition to Lee Hall. Using a quarter of the energy that other Clemson buildings need per square foot, it was designed to be able to generate as much energy as it uses and won LEED Gold distinction as a result.
And in the year since it opened, Schwennsen has already seen it shape how students are working.
Its floor plan is more open, so they’re influenced by each other’s ideas more. It has a skylight- and window-heavy design, so students are more conscious of natural light. They’ve even started holding lights up to their models to see how it comes in.
Like past changes to the architecture school’s facilities, the move demonstrates that the space you work in can shape the work you produce.
“It changes the way they think,” Schwennsen said.