UC Berkeley College of Environmental Design

Architect, author, and educator Lester Wertheimer, FAIA, credits his success to his experience studying architecture at UC Berkeley in the 1940s and 1950s. “My life was because of Berkeley,” he exclaims.

The opportunity to travel and discover the world’s great architecture profoundly impacted Wertheimer, as a person and as an architect. So in 2016, he and his wife Elyse Lewin, a photographer and commercials director, established the Harold Stump Memorial Traveling Fellowship, named for his beloved professor. It supports independent travel for MArch students to explore a particular architectural question or issue. The Wertheimers wanted to give future generations of Berkeley students the opportunity to explore world architecture as he had done in the early 1950s.

Read more: https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/lester-wertheimer-studying-architecture-berkeley-stump-traveling-fellowship

"By creating space that connects and facilitates collaboration, it's inevitable that Bauer Wurster has played a vital role in shaping both the academic and social lives for all of Berkeley's environmental design students... it's one of the most welcoming and inclusive places on campus." —Vincent Luo (BA Architecture + French 2026), Daily Cal

Read "Wurster Hall, cozy home, gentle relationship builder: A Commentary" in the Daily Cal: https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/bauer-wurster-dailycal

Photo: Martha Tibballs

Peer into BART’s history — and check out some early designs of the BART logo! Which do you like best?

These logo drawings are on view in Along the Line: Designing and Planning BART, 1963–1976, an exhibition in the Environmental Design Library. The exhibition also includes photographs, models, documents, and ephemera, with sections on the prewar road and transit systems, regional planning, early plans for BART, the image of the system (including train car and logo designs), community resistance to the project, the role of stations in urban renewal, and the opening of the system in 1972.

Along the Line: ON VIEW in the Environmental Design Library through Oct 31.

Read more: https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/bart-documents-architecture-design

1 - BART logo, designed by Sundberg-Ferar, c. 1970;
2 - Alternates for BART logo, designed by Tallie Maule, c. 1970

Courtesy Tallie Maule collection

So proud of professor and chair of our Department of Landscape Architecture & Environmental Planning for receiving this honor.

Walter Hood Wins 2024 Vincent Scully Prize The Oakland, California-based landscape designer will be presented with the award during an October 4 ceremony held at the National Building Museum.

So much fun celebrate the first day of classes with the entire CED community at the Welcome (Back) Party! 🎉

So much fun celebrate the first day of classes with the entire CED community at the Welcome (Back) Party!

As we get ready to welcome CED students back to campus for the start of the fall semester next week, let’s not forget our MUD and MRED+D students who have just wrapped up their summer semester! These 12-month, 3-semester programs — Master of Urban Design and Master of Real Estate Development + Design — keep Bauer Wurster Hall buzzing all year long!

On July 23, Biohabitats' Keith Bowers, East Bay Regional Park District's Dr. Ana M Alvarez, and The Nature of Cities' David Maddox will lead a high-level discussion about trends that landscape architects need to know in this free webinar from the Landscape Architecture Foundation, moderated by UC Berkeley College of Environmental Design's Kristina Hill. Learn more and register https://bit.ly/3S0lL3L.

We’re happy to announce Metropolis Magazine has selected Jack Tam (MArch 2024) for the Future100 class of 2024.

Each year, a jury of design experts extends this designation to the top 100 graduating architecture and interior design students in the U.S. and Canada. Metropolis honors graduates whose work shows a commitment to make an impact through design — with detailed research, fresh methodologies, and innovative materiality.

“The award reaffirms my dedication to crafting designs that prioritize community well-being and environmental sustainability,” says Tam.

Read more 🔗https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/metropolis-names-jack-tam-among-100-top-graduating-architecture-students-of-2024

Images:
1 - Metropolis Future100
2 - Jack Tam
3 - from project “Urban Regeneration: Agri-Topia” by Jack Tam

Congratulations to Cheng-Kai (Kai) Hsu .c.k, who won two fellowships for his dissertation on road safety for gig workers in Taiwan and Latin America.

Hsu, a PhD candidate in the Department of City & Regional Planning, explores how the on-demand economy’s promise of ever-faster delivery times, coupled with extreme heat, increase the risk of road traffic injuries for food-delivery workers. His research highlights the urgent need for regulatory oversight in the gig economy to safeguard the road safety of this vulnerable occupational group and the general public. The two prestigious fellowships — Institute of Research on Labor and Employment Dissertation Fellowship and the Roselyn Lindheim Award in Environmental Design and Public Health — recognize the importance of his work.

Read more 🚧 https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/phd-candidate-wins-two-prestigious-fellowships-for-research-into-road-safety-in-the-age-of-uber-eats

The College of Environmental Design is pleased to announce the 2024 Distinguished Alumni Award recipients. This year, we honored four alums at our commencement ceremony on May 13:

Gloria Bruce
Master of City Planning 2006
Program Director of Housing Security, Crankstart Foundation

Ricardo Capretta
Bachelor of Arts in Architecture 1981
President, Capretta Architecture + Planning + Building

Dorothée Imbert
Master of Architecture + Master of Landscape Architecture 1989
Director, Knowlton School of Architecture, Hubert C. Schmidt '38 Chair in Landscape Architecture, The Ohio State University

Stanley Saitowtiz
Master of Architecture 1977
Professor Emeritus of Architecture, College of Environmental Design, UC Berkeley

The Distinguished Alumni Award honors alums who have exhibited outstanding public service, in its broadest sense, throughout their careers. Since its inception in 1998, the award has celebrated outstanding practitioners and academics who have made a meaningful impact for environmental good.

Congratulations!

Read more about our awardees and their work 🔗
https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/distinguished-alumni-awards-2024

Photos:

1 - Ric Capretta, Gloria Bruce, Stanley Saitowitz, and Dorothée Imbert
2 - Graduates at CED's commencement ceremony
3 - Distinguished Alumni Awards made by CED's fabrication department

The College of Environmental Design’s announces the recipients of the 2024 Lau Grants for Just Climate Futures. 🌱 This year's projects focus on neighborhood energy-sharing strategies, flood adaptation in unincorporated areas, and heat and pollution in urbanizing towns.

Our one-year accelerator Lau Grants for Just Climate Futures recipients are Luisa Caldas (), Professor of Architecture, Lu Liang (.liang.ucb), Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture & Environmental Planning, and Danielle Zoe Rivera (.z.rivera), Assistant Professor of Landscape Architecture & Environmental Planning.

Cross-disciplinary teams will work over the next six months to develop scalable, place-based solutions to the climate crisis. A team led by Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture & Environmental Design and Urban Design Kristina Hill that received a two-year translational grant last year will continue its work this summer, building an air quality digital twin.

Established in 2023, the Lau grant program supports projects led by CED faculty that aim to reduce the impacts of climate change, incorporate community engagement, and emphasize equitable, actionable solutions.

Read more 🔗 in bio: https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/2024-lau-grants-for-just-climate-futures-awarded

Photo: Flooding in Pájaro River Valley, 2023, by Danielle Zoe Rivera

CED is pleased to announce that Sandhya Naidu Janardhanjas beem named the 2024–2024 Berkeley Rupp Prize winner.

Naidu Janardhan, a leader in community-led design and sustainable architecture, is the founder and managing director of Mumbai-based Community Design Agency, which brings together researchers, architects, engineers, business professionals, planners, and artists to work directly with disenfranchised communities.

“A recognition of this nature for a practice from the Global South brings to light the significance and foundational role of the built environment, which is often overlooked in creating equitable communities. This will no doubt have a catalyzing effect on our work and impact,” says Naidu Janardhan.

Naidu Janardhan is the sixth recipient of the Berkeley Rupp Prize, which provides recognition and support of the special values that women bring to the built environment.

Photos:
1 - The Sanjaynagar initiative provides climate-resilient, sustainable homes to 298 families, improving their health and wellbeing and uplifting generations out of poverty. Photo credit: Rajesh Vora
2 - Sandhya Naidu Janardhan. Photo credit: Khamkha Photoartist

Read more at 🔗 in bio https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/berkeley-rupp-prize-sandhya-naidu-janardhan

Introducing CED's 2024 Commencement student speakers! 🎓

Derek Davis — Bachelor of Architecture

Derek is interested in sustainable, community-centered, social justice work in design and entered UC Berkeley as a recipient of the Cal Alumni Association Leadership Award and an African American Initiative Scholar. Derek served as a Community Design Fellow, Studio Instructor for the EmbARC Summer Design Academy, Student Co-Director at the American Institute of Architects—East Bay, and Vice President of Berkeley’s Student Chapter of the National Organization of Minority Architects.

Lynsey Coke-Ferreira — Master of Landscape Architecture

Lynsey, a mother to two young daughters, has lived in the Bay Area for 7 years. Originally from Glasgow, Scotland, Lynsey received a Bachelor of Design from the University of Dundee and a Masters in Material Futures from Central Saint Martins. In the final year of her MLA program, Lynsey focused on designing meaningful, hopeful landscapes tailored for individuals facing end-of-life or those who are grieving.

Revati Rajwade — Master of Real Estate Development + Design

Revati is an architect from India who has been a part of transformative developments in the real estate and architecture industry in Mumbai. She joined the MRED+D program program to augment her skillset and gain holistic understanding of real estate development. Post MREDD, Revati aims to enhance functionality, prioritize sustainability, and ensure equitable development.

Yanin Alexa Kramsky— PhD in City + Regional Planning

With designated emphasis in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and Global Metropolitan Studies, Yanin's research delves into the impacts of disasters and disaster governance — particularly wildfires in Northern California — on people with non-normative bodies and minds. Yanin received a Master of Environmental Science from Yale University and studied industrial design and illustration as an undergraduate at ArtCenter College of Design.

Congratulations grads!

Happy birthday to John Galen Howard who was born 160 years ago today, May 8th!

John Galen Howard was the supervising architect for UC Berkeley from 1901-1922, and was the founder of its School of Architecture. If you’ve been anywhere on campus, you have seen and heard the campanile. As campus architect, Howard was responsible for many of its landmark buildings, including Sather Gate and Sather Tower (better known as the Campanile). Visible for miles, the Campanile is 307 feet tall and is the third tallest bell tower in the world. It was modeled after the tower that stands in the Piazza San Marco in Venice, Italy.

Following his departure from the university, he moved to San Francisco and wrote poetry.

These drawings from the show some of Howard’s preliminary ideas for these structures, reminding us — design is a process. 📐 🖼️

Photos:

Drawings courtesy of the Environmental Design Archives and the John Galen Howard Collection.

Forest to frame — Paul Mayencourt bridges forest management and sustainable construction. “Forestry thinks about forests up until the point that trees become logs,” says Paul Mayencourt, “and architecture only starts to think about wood after it has been transformed into a building product.” An assistant professor of Cooperative Extension cross-appointed between the Departments of Architecture and Environmental Science, Policy, and Management, Mayencourt dwells in this the gap between the two disciplines, at the nexus of forest management and wood construction.

He describes his approach as “forest-to-frame,” riffing on California’s famed farm-to-table movement.

Read more about Mayencourt's work, from mass timber to solar kilns!

🔗 ced.berkeley.edu/news/forest-to-frame-mayencourt-management-sustainability

🏠🧱🛠️📝

Congratulations to newly anointed Rome Prize fellow Dan Spiegel, continuing lecturer in the Department of Architecture, and Megumi Aihara of Spiegel Aihara Workshop.

Announcing the 2024–25 Rome Prize Winners The American Academy in Rome announced today the winners of the 2024–25 Rome Prize.

Happy Earth Day! 🌎

Today the College of Environmental Design highlights the work of faculty whose projects forge innovations in climate resilience through explorations in building technologies and materials.

☀️ SOLAR KILN – Paul L. Mayencourt, Assistant Professor of Cooperative Extension

A crucial step in wood processing is wood drying. It has to be dried to a specific moisture content before manufacturing. “Up to 90% of the embodied carbon in lumber is a result of the drying process,” explains Mayencourt. In contrast to industrial kilns that rely heavily on fossil fuels, solar kilns can play a key role in reducing the amount of energy used in wood construction.

🪵 MASS TIMBER - Mark Anderson, Professor of Architecture, Principal at Anderson Anderson Architecture

Mark Anderson aims to harness the potential of wood construction to sequester carbon and reverse climate change. His project Rough Timber prototypes a low-carbon, low-technology DIY housing construction system for post-wildfire housing solutions using mass timber. “New approaches to wood construction methods — that recognize current climate change and local forest conditions — offer opportunities to improve the environment and quality of life in areas affected by wildfires,” says Anderson.

🌿 HEMPCRETE - Neyran Turan, Associate Professor of Architecture

“Hempcrete is a plant-based building material with extraordinary regenerative potential, “ says Neyran Turan. Carbon-negative and a relatively new construction building material, h**pcrete a mixture of h**p hurds, water, and a lime-based binder and can be cast like concrete. Turan designed and a code-compliant small house to demonstrate how this environmentally friendly building material can help mitigate the amount of carbon used in the construction of new homes.

Photo credits:
1- Solar Kiln by Paul L. Mayencourt installed at Richmond Field Station

2 - Mark Anderson, examples of mass timber on display in the Lau Grants for Just Climate Futures exhibition
3 - Neyran Turan, h**pcrete wall on on display in the Lau Grants for Just Climate Futures exhibition

Happy Earth Day! 🌎

Today the College of Environmental Design highlights the work of faculty whose projects forge innovations in climate resilience through explorations in building technologies and materials.

☀️ SOLAR KILN – Paul L. Mayencourt, Assistant Professor of Cooperative Extension

A crucial step in wood processing is wood drying. It has to be dried to a specific moisture content before manufacturing. “Up to 90% of the embodied carbon in lumber is a result of the drying process,” explains Mayencourt. In contrast to industrial kilns that rely heavily on fossil fuels, solar kilns can play a key role in reducing the amount of energy used in wood construction.

🪵 MASS TIMBER - Mark Anderson, Professor of Architecture, Principal at Anderson Anderson Architecture

Mark Anderson aims to harness the potential of wood construction to sequester carbon and reverse climate change. His project Rough Timber prototypes a low-carbon, low-technology DIY housing construction system for post-wildfire housing solutions using mass timber. “New approaches to wood construction methods — that recognize current climate change and local forest conditions — offer opportunities to improve the environment and quality of life in areas affected by wildfires,” says Anderson.

🌿 HEMPCRETE - Neyran Turan, Associate Professor of Architecture

“Hempcrete is a plant-based building material with extraordinary regenerative potential, “ says Neyran Turan. Carbon-negative and a relatively new construction building material, h**pcrete a mixture of h**p hurds, water, and a lime-based binder and can be cast like concrete. Turan designed and a code-compliant small house to demonstrate how this environmentally friendly building material can help mitigate the amount of carbon used in the construction of new homes.

Photo credits:
1- Solar Kiln by Paul L. Mayencourt installed at Richmond Field Station
2 - Mark Anderson, examples of mass timber on display in the Lau Grants for Just Climate Futures exhibition
3 - Neyran Turan, h**pcrete wall on on display in the Lau Grants for Just Climate Futures exhibition

ON VIEW NOW! Along the Line: Designing + Planning BART (1963-1972)

Journey through BART’s architectural and design history, featuring architects and planners involved in BART’s beginnings.

Adding context and dimension to current discussions about BART’s future, the exhibition includes sections on: car and logo design, the elevated track and linear parkway in the East Bay, urban renewal at the Embarcadero station, and the architecture of the Glen Park and El Cerrito del Norte stations.

BART leadership wanted “esthetically pleasing” stations surrounded by landscapes that would both enhance the rider’s experience and “make a contribution to the community through which [BART] passes.”

Designers seized the opportunity to contribute to the Bay Area’s design reputation, believing their theories and methods would inspire new generations of architects.

Along the Line: Designing + Planning BART 🚊1963-1972
ON VIEW until August 3, 2024
Environmental Design Library
210 Bauer Wurster Hall
OPEN during library hours

Photo credit(s):
1 - Downtown Berkeley station, c. 1973 by Tallie Maule
2 - Model of El Cerrito del Norte station
3 - Rendering of BART aerial structure, c. 1965 by Ernest Born
4 - A description of the BART Impact Program, 1976 + Model of advertising kiosks, 1971
5 - Regional Planning for the Next Million People by Telesis, 1950

@‌transsoc

Link in bio 🔗 https://ced.berkeley.edu/events/along-the-line-designing-and-planning-bart-1963-1976

Born

Big Give — UC Berkeley’s annual one-day fundraising blitz — turns 10 years old this year! Celebrate this milestone with us by showing your support for the College of Environmental Design. Let’s come together to fund critical projects that make a direct impact on our students, including new equipment for the Fabrication Shop. Help us make this Big Give the most impactful one yet!
Give at the link in our bio.⭐️
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On , we remember architect Julia Morgan. A 1894 graduate of UC Berkeley and the first woman to be admitted to the architecture program at the prestigious Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, Morgan became the first licensed female architect in California. She enjoyed a long and prolific career, designing more than 700 buildings – including UC Berkeley’s very own Hearst Memorial Gym (with Bernard Maybeck).

The Environmental Design Archives holds a significant collection of Morgan’s drawings, personal and professional papers, and project records.

The CED community loves public transit! Check out this video of Michael Lin (BA Architecture 2001) talking to NBC Bay Area about converting a vintage BART car into an Airbnb in California's Gold Country.

A closer look: BART car Airbnb plan Would you be interested in sleeping or camping in an old BART car? There’s a plan to turn one of the train cars into an Airbnb. NBC Bay Area’s Raj Mathai spoke to Michael Lin, who came up with the idea, for more on the project.

Next week! Environmental artist Lauren Bon of Metabolic Studio talks about her project dismantling the LA River and restoring its floodplain as part of the CED Fall Lecture Series, Living With — and Without — Water. The Brooklyn Rail calls Bon "a visionary . . . who has carved out a space between land art and conceptual art, where there is a tension that continues to generate an expanded notion of art and an expanded notion of society."

Lauren Bon | Un-development: Unsealing the Earth and Letting Her Breathe Environmental artist Lauren Bon talks about her ecological reparation project along the LA River, which uses the concept of un-development to revitalize the relationship between the city and its environment.

Submissions for the Arcus | Places Prize close September 15! A collaboration with Places Journal, the award supports public scholarship on gender, sexuality, and the built-environment.

2023 Arcus | Places Prize We're now accepting applications for the the latest round of the Arcus | Places Prize for innovative public scholarship on gender, sexuality, and the built environment.

We kick off the CED fall lectures series tomorrow night with Professor David Sedlak, an expert on urban water systems. His is the first of five presentations focusing on how to adapt the built environment to a future with too little, or too much, water. Wednesday, Sep. 6, 6:30 PM. In person. Bauer Wurster Auditorium. Free and open to the public. Hope to see you there!

David Sedlak | Premise-Scale Water Systems: A New Tool for Adapting Cities to a Changing Climate David Sedlak kicks off the College of Environmental Design’s fall lectures series, Living With — and Without — Water. David Sedlak is the Plato Malozemoff Professor in the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering at UC Berkeley where he is the Director of the Berkeley Water Center.

We're excited to welcome Liz Gálvez to the architecture faculty!

Liz Gálvez joins the Department of Architecture The prize–winning architect and founding principal of Office e.g. is focused on developing new environmentalisms in architecture.

It's the first day of classes and we're excited to share that Professor Walter Hood is starting a term as chair of Landscape Architecture & Environmental Planning.
https://ced.berkeley.edu/news/walter-hood-takes-helm-of-berkeleys-department-of-landscape-architecture-environmental-planning