About Architecture
Overview
RMIT Architecture is based in the urban centre of Melbourne, Australia, on Swanston Street, the main spine of the Melbourne CBD grid.
The RMIT Architecture Discipline is one of five design disciplines within the multi-discipline RMIT School of Architecture and Design, along with Fashion, Industrial Design, Interior Design, Landscape Architecture and the Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory (SIAL) (Opens new window) design and digital technologies research cluster.
RMIT Architecture offers Architecture professional degree pathways through the three year Bachelor of Architectural Design degree and the two year Master of Architecture professional coursework degree. At RMIT students undertake dedicated, design focused architectural study from the first week of first year. The rich variety of balloted design studio and elective offerings provide students with extensive opportunities to explore a broad and relevant range of studies and interests.
The teaching and research undertaken at RMIT Architecture is primarily project-based and design focused. Most of the academic staff are active practitioners and the sessional staff who teach design are drawn from key innovative practices based in the CBD.
Postgraduate research supervision is offered through the Master of Architectural Research and the Phd, with candidates undertaking research by thesis and by project. RMIT Architecture was the first architecture program internationally to offer postgraduate project-based design research degrees twenty years ago. The model has since been adopted and adapted by key international institutions such as the Bartlett School of Architecture in London.
The RMIT School of Architecture and Design holds twice yearly Graduate Research Conferences. These are key events on the calendar when postgraduate candidates are examined by exhibition and give presentations of work in progress to panels made up of local and international design research critics.
There is a clear continuity in the philosophy and approach to architectural education and research at RMIT from the undergraduate and professional degrees through to postgraduate supervision and staff research and design practice activities. The RMIT Architecture discipline is characterised by:
- teaching and research through design
- project-based investigation
- a qualitative and speculative focus
- the promoting of innovation in industry and practice
- contributions to community development through applied projects
- being locally situated, regionally engaged and internationally networked
We seek to explore the emergence of innovative practices within the context of international architectural debate. We do this by employing design as a primary means to investigate ideas about society and our place in the environment. Our approach forges a nexus, a tension and a symbiotic relationship between the profession and practice of architecture and the architectural academy. The program aims to engage constantly in an exploration of the differences and the connections between the two.
We utilise Melbourne and Australia as laboratories for architectural inquiry. However, the concerns of the program are ultimately international in that we endeavour to maintain a focus on emerging architectural principles and practices applicable to a wide range of contexts. The program seeks to promote a constructive environment for learning through project-based research, critical debate and rigorous enquiry.
It is our aim to produce graduates prepared and able to take responsibility for their actions in the physical environment. Graduates who are equipped with excellent technical and critical capabilities are better able to become leaders in the profession. Graduates should be able to take a position on an architectural question, informed by relevant research and rigorous critical assessment, and develop innovative architectural responses through recurring cycles of application and reflection.
They should possess a sound basic knowledge and range of skills, and the critical acumen to continue to question and learn in their future careers. Ultimately at RMIT, students are encouraged to consider the study of architecture as a significant way of thinking as well as training for a specific vocation. Debate, dialogue and critical thinking are strongly encouraged at all levels in the discipline.
History of the Discipline of Architecture at RMIT
Architecture has a long history as a discipline at RMIT. Architecture courses have been taught at RMIT since its inception in 1887. Over a period of 130 years, the Architecture discipline at RMIT has consistently maintained a very close engagement with innovative architectural practices in Melbourne. Key early Heads of Architecture included prominent architects Percy Oakden (Opens new window) and Harold Desbrowe-Annear (Opens new window).
Graeme Gunn (Opens new window) is a very successful Melbourne practitioner who, as Head of Architecture in the 1970's, introduced key innovations such as balloted and vertically streamed design studios, and placed a strong emphasis on having academic members of staff who maintained an active engagement with practice. Key figures such as RAIA Gold Medal winning architect Peter Corrigan, joined the staff at this time.
Leon van Schaik, who came from the Architecture Association in London to lead the discipline as Professor of Architecture from the mid-1980's, internationalised the architecture program and extended the design studio model to the postgraduate research level, introducing postgraduate research by project degrees and the postgraduate reflective practice invited stream. He has taken a leading role in the university's approach to commissioning innovative architects to design a series of award winning RMIT campus projects, including RMIT Storey Hall, Building 8 and the current CUB site redevelopment and Design Hub facilities.
The School of Architecture and Design was formed in 1999, and encompasses the disciplines of Architecture, Fashion, Industrial Design, Interior Design and Landscape Architecture. The Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory is a trans-diciplinary research cluster focusing on the role of digital technologies across the spatial design disciplines.
Previous Heads of the multi-discipline School have included Professor Peter Downton and Professor Harriet Edquist. The focus on design teaching and research continues to be consolidated under the leadership of Richard Blythe, director of the award winning architectural practice Terroir (Opens new window).
The Discipline of Architecture at RMIT is led by the Architecture Program Director, a position held over the past recent period by Sand Helsel, Shane Murray, Richard Fooks, Brent Allpress, Martyn Hook and Graham Crist.
The structure of the Discipline of Architecture at RMIT has been revised a number of times over its long history. The professional degree was offered initially as a Diploma of Architecture. In the 1970's RMIT introduced the 5 year Bachelor of Architecture professional degree. In 2008, RMIT has introduced new professional degree pathways through the Bachelor of Architectural Design degree (3 years) and the Master of Architecture professional coursework degree (2 years). This structure aligns with the 3 + 2 model that is being increasingly adopted internationally and across Australia and New Zealand, while maintaining the characteristic elements that distinguish the RMIT model of design focused project-based learning through vertically integrated balloted design studios and electives.
In the late 1980's, RMIT Architecture was the first architecture discipline internationally to introduce project-based design research supervision through the Master of Architectural Research (by project) and the PhD in Architectural Research (by project) degrees, under the leadership of Prof. Leon van Schaik and Peter Downton. The model has been adapted by the Bartlett School of Architecture and other institutions following the involvement of international visiting critics and examiners such as Colin Fournier and Jonathan Hill. The project-based research model has also been adopted by the other design disciplines across the RMIT School of Architecture and Design who come together for the twice yearly Graduate Research Conferences.
Applying to RMIT Architecture
Application information for all Architecture programs
Exhibitions
End of Semester Design Studios Exhibition
There are public exhibitions of all student design studio work at the end of each semester in the level 12 studios. Refer to the events list for details.
Major Project Design Thesis exhibitions
A biennial Final Year Design Thesis exhibition of Major Project design research work is held in a gallery in the city to celebrate the work undertaken during the program and make available the design work of graduates to the broader community and industry.
Exhibition projects
The Program also regularly initiates and participates in a range of exhibitions, particularly to frame and disseminate project-based design research and emerging practice in local and international exhibition venues.
Research
Architecture staff research activities and outcomes, postgraduate degrees, research news, streams, resources, projects, publications, exhibitions, conferences, grants, resources, and school research info
RMIT Architecture Postgraduate Programs
The RMIT Architecture Program offers Masters and PhD Architecture research degrees. The Program has over the past 20 years pioneered and promoted the model of research by project, where candidates undertake design research through project-based investigation. Research embodied within projects is framed and situated through exegesis, which may be written or involve other disciplinary modes of framing representation such as diagrams, models and drawings.
RMIT Architecture Research Streams
Research degrees are offered in a number of streams:
candidate nominated research; reflective practice (invited stream); urban architecture laboratory; spatial information architecture laboratory (digital design research); architectural history, theory and design discourse; sustainable architecture; expanded field - interdisciplinary practices.
Design research laboratories
Urban Architecture Laboratory (UAL)
Offers a number of undergraduate design studios and seminars, and a final year Major Project stream providing pathways to urban architectural design research within the three-semester full time postgraduate Masters of Architecture UAL postgraduate program.
Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory (Opens new window)
Offers a number of undergraduate design studios and seminars, and a final year Major Project stream providing pathways to digital design research within the SIAL postgraduate program.
International Linkages
RMIT Architecture is committed to engaging with and contributing to emerging architectural practices, research and debate in an international context. The program features regular international visiting academics and practitioners who offer public lectures, design studio and research workshops, seminars and act as postgraduate examiners and critics.
RMIT Architecture students have a number of opportunities to participate in international educational programs,
Architecture international exchange and study abroad
Information for International Study Abroad and Exchange students applying to study at RMIT, and for RMIT students applying to study on exchange at an Architecture School overseas.
Our students have opportunities to study on exchange in respected Architecture Schools in countries such as Italy, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Japan, the USA and the UK. When our students go on one of these study tours or exchanges, international studios or exchanges, academic credit is given. The feedback we receive is that these international educational experiences are often a highlight of a student's undergraduate program. We strongly encouraged all new students to organise their time and budget to allow participation in an overseas study group at some stage during their studies.
International study tours, traveling studios and workshops
Australians studying abroad (ASA)/RMIT Architecture
Contemporary European Architecture and Urban Design and the Heritage of Modernism.
RMIT Architecture regularly offers design studios that travel to other countries.
RMIT Architecture resources and facilities
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