Facilities

The school’s facilities overlook Lake Osceola at the heart of the University. Marion Manley, the first registered female architect in South Florida, designed the six original buildings of the School in 1947 as part of a compound built to house the returning veterans of World War II. The buildings reflect an association with the work of the Bauhaus that Walter Gropius was advocating in the U.S. during the same period. The history was a significant consideration when the buildings were transformed in 1983 into the offices, studios, and classrooms of today. The Jorge M. Perez Architecture Center, a new focus for the original buildings, provides space for large gatherings, lectures and exhibitions.

The Jorge M. Perez Architecture Center
The Center, dedicated in October of 2005, is the hub of the architecture campus. Made possible by a donation from Jorge M. Perez, CEO of The Related Group and a University trustee, the building was designed by Leon Krier, the world renowned architectural theorist and innovator in the New Urbanism movement. The Center houses the Stanley and Jewell Glasgow Lecture Hall seating 144, an exhibition gallery, and the Marshall and Vera Lea Rinker Digital Conferencing Classroom. The Thomas F. Daly Loggia and the Leonard and Jayne L. Abess Breezeway complete the complex.

Studios and Faculty Offices
Two of the original buildings form large open studios for first and second year students. Smaller office-like studios serving the upper levels are adjacent to faculty offices and ensure close collaboration among faculty and students. The studios are accessible twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. Each student is assigned a work station and given a key to the designated studio.

Classrooms
In addition to the Rinker Classroom in the Architecture Center, two additional classrooms serve the undergraduate and graduate curriculum, one on the third floor of the administrative building, and a multimedia room above the Computing Laboratory. A large drawing studio houses the School’s collection of plaster casts and wood models.

Review Spaces
The exhibition gallery in the Architecture Center along with several large spaces near studios and administrative offices provide review space for student presentations.