Foundation Studio I

Abstract

Foundation Studio I introduces students to working with living systems and dynamic landscape processes through a rule-based design methodology. With an emphasis on translating and synthesizing scientific information through rigorous drawing, this course teaches students how to design with the climate, geology, soil, water and vegetation as responsive and relational systems.

Objective

This design studio builds on a series of precise exercises that translate and synthesize the scientific information learned in the linked fundamental module courses required by the MScLA program. Through these exercises, students acquire essential analytical and methodological skills to support design in the field of Landscape Architecture. Drawing from regenerative agriculture, students will learn to design with landscape practices aiming to support soil systems and biological complexity. By identifying and designing with key parameters of these practices on site, students learn to design evolving systems that respond to situated potentials.

Content

Foundation Studio I in the autumn semester 2025 is located at a red clay quarry in the municipality of El Papiol, just south of Barcelona along the Llobregat River. Throughout the semester students translate the particular conditions of this site of extraction, rigorously drawing local climatic, geologic, hydrological, pedological and vegetative processes, and situating these systems in a larger context. Working with this method of translation, students make design proposals that respond to the unique material and ecological potentials the quarry. Course desk crits, pin-ups, site visits and reviews are generally scheduled in the afternoon, and are linked to the content covered in the lectures and other theoretical inputs from the morning fundamental course. A 4-day site visit will take place in the first week of the semester.

Resources