Henry Rueda Vert web

At the FIU Department of Architecture, we are committed to the challenges and amazing opportunities that the City of Miami and South Florida bring to our students and faculty. We believe that bringing together faculty, researchers, planners, consultants, and thinkers on topics such as, academic excellence, innovation, building practices, climate justice and leadership, will prepare our students to confront and succeed on the complex challenges of our built environment.

This year, we are celebrating our 25^th anniversary, the moment in which we were officially established as “a new School of Architecture”, and we have many reasons to celebrate.

Our Master of Architecture, accredited by the National Architectural Accreditation

Board (NAAB), has been growing consistently over the last years; our students and faculty had been winning awards and recognitions, nationally and internationally.

Our Doctor of Design program lead by Dr. Neil Leach, with faculty, students, and researchers from all over the world, is one of only five post-professional DDes programs nationwide. Today we can confidently say that we are responsible for the education of architects and leaders with doctoral degrees to meet the challenges facing the profession and discipline.

The Department’s facilities are the most exciting place for our students to experiment and learning by making. Together with the Miami Beach Urban Studios MBUS, Fabrication Lab, Structures and Environment Technologies (SET) Lab and our Robotics and Digital Fabrication Lab (RDF Lab), faculty, researchers and students are actively collaborating on historic preservation, climate, environment, technology and building practice challenges. Faculty research has been augmented with new grants and awards lead by Dr. Shahin Vassigh, Biayna Bogosian and Eric Peterson.

We are one of the 25 architecture programs participating in the Integrated Path to Architectural Licensure IPAL program. Selected students’ interns are working at leading professional practices, to gain the requisite internship hours needed for licensure. As part of our commitment to career success, we now offer a required course on the Architectural Registration Exam (ARE) for 5^th year students.

After a two years hiatus, our faculty and students are back to our study abroad program. Last summer we had 3 Studios doing programs in Barcelona, Spain and 1 Studio in the Bauhaus Workshop-Dessau and Berlin, Germany. In Fall 2022, 16 students + 3 faculty will study and travel through Italy and Europe, and in Spring 2023, 20 students + 3 faculty will be back to the Convento di Santa Maria di Castello in Genoa, Italy for full a full semester abroad. Next summer 2023, we will be back to Tokyo, Japan.

This potent and diverse mix of talents and cultures is our engine. This is how we prepare our students for innovation and progress. Miami is our urban laboratory; it is the place that energizes our practice and research.

We know that 25 years is only the beginning, we are confident on our role with local and global communities. We understand the challenges and opportunities of planning, designing buildings, objects, structures, technology, infrastructures, and policies.

We are committed to working with you and making better cities.

Henry Rueda
Chair of the Department of Architecture
Associate Teaching Professor
hruedaco@fiu.edu

First adopted by faculty vote April 2007 then amended by the faculty in spring of 2016.

Mission: As part of FIU, a “top public research university,” the Architecture department is dedicated to educating future generations of ethical professionals, creative designers and informed citizens.

Vision: We believe architecture to be a conceptually based intellectual endeavor and a form of critical inquiry that addresses the built and natural environments from the scale of the city to the scale of the detail. The department is committed to producing conceptual thinkers and skilled makers who are versed in the techniques and knowledge of the discipline and who are cognizant of: critical theory, history, science and progressive social values. To realize these objectives, design is taught as a critical, speculative and creative endeavor embracing both the humanities and the sciences.

To achieve our mission and vision, our decisions and actions are informed by the following seven core values and beliefs:

1. Diversity

Serving a diverse student body with a variety of academic backgrounds, experiences and interests by creating an open atmosphere of inquiry and exchange that engages the varied cultural and academic experiences of faculty and students.

2. Design as Critical Thinking

Presenting architecture as a reflective and conceptually based discipline. We encourage students to form thoughtful and imaginative solutions to the challenges confronting urban society here and abroad and to cultivate intellectual curiosity and life-long learning.

3. Education of the Professional

The department educates professionals. Students learn the disciplinary norms of knowledge and skills necessary to take leadership roles in a changing profession.

4. Commitment to Innovation

Celebrating the power of innovation and experimentation and our discipline’s commitment to imagine and construct beautiful, healthful and responsible environments.

5. Appreciation for the Constructed and the Natural Environments

Fostering sensitivity and appreciation for the constructed and natural environments of South Florida and engaging our communities’ challenges. The Architecture department values the unique opportunities and challenges for creative exploration and problem-solving afforded by South Florida’s rich sub-tropical ecologies, urban contexts as well as multicultural and multilingual populace.

6. Culture of Connectivity

Promoting connections between the Department of Architecture and members of the design community in local, national and international, academic, professional and lay contexts. In particular, we seek to engage our colleagues in the college and the school, local practitioners in design education and to develop cooperative links with schools of design in the Americas, Asia, Africa, and Europe.

7. Ethos of Trans-Disciplinary

Engaging adjacent disciplines within the School of Architecture to create an atmosphere of trans-disciplinary cooperation in order to collaboratively address the complex spatial, economic, social and environmental challenges of contemporary practice.