The online community Archinect recently posed questions to the heads of some of the leading Architecture schools across the country. Dean Nader Tehrani was one of the six respondents who cemented Cooper Union as the vanguard of free expression. Archinect’s questions focused on how the pedagogical community plans on responding to the views of President-elect Trump and nature of the implications of his presidency on the practice of Architecture. Dean Tehrani describes the “call to intellectual arms” as an ethos that must be maintained both in the present moment and sustained moving forward:

 “Our responsibilities are to expose intellectual projects, to reveal positions and to enable the space of disagreement.”

Congratulations to Visiting Professor Sean Canty and Instructor Stephanie Lin, two recent additions to the School of Architecture faculty, who have been selected as finalists for the MoMA Young Architects Program (YAP) for their collaborative work as Office of Three. The winning architect(s) will install a structure in PS1’s iconic courtyard during its summer 2017 for its Warm-Up music series.

A full list of this year’s finalists can be found here. Previous winners of the prize include BEATFUSE! by Pablo Castro and 1997 Cooper Union architecture graduate Jennifer Lee of OBRA Architects.

An array of architectural models from the Spring 2016 Design IV studio, led by Professor Diane Lewis, Professor Peter Schubert, Instructor Daniel Meridor, Visiting Assistant Professor Daniel Sherer and Visiting Lecturer Francois de Menil is now on display in an unlikely venue. The East 57^th Street windows of upscale men’s clothing retailer, Turnbull & Asser, feature models by Aimilios Davantlis Lo, Jorge Flores, Sam Koopman, Kelsey Lee, Piao Liu, Hui Rong Liu, Hugh Scott Moncrieff, Stephanie Restrepo and Kyle Schroeder, channeling the lifestyle of the urban architect. Inspired by the display of fourth year design studio work in the ground floor windows of Cooper Union’s Foundation Building as part of the 2016 End of Year Show, Zander Scheider, Turnbull & Asser’s director of design, called on the talents of Cooper’s architecture students to enhance the architect-themed display. The installation will be on view until November 11^th at 50 East 57^th Street. Read More on Cooper Union’s website.

Cooper Alum, Laurie Hawkinson (AR ’83) has just been appointed to the NYC Public Design Commission, New York City’s design review agency. In mayor Bill De Blasio’s announcement, he stated; “Laurie’s years of work designing projects for a wide range of clientele, both domestically and internationally, as well as both privately and publically, demonstrate her expertise in the field”. In this position, Ms. Hawkinson will oversee proposals for permanent works of architecture, landscape architecture and art on city-owned property as part of an 11-member council.

Since graduating from The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture of the Cooper Union, Hawkinson has received an MA in Department of Art Practice from UC-Berkeley, and a Bachelor of Fine Arts from UC-Berkeley. She is a partner at Smith-Miller + Hawkinson Architects (SMH+) and Professor of Architecture at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, and currently serves on Columbia University’s Professional Schools’ Diversity Council.

Hawkinson joins two other Cooper Union architecture graduates with high profile civic posts. In August, 2016 Mayor de Blasio nominated Michael Samuelian (AR’95) as President and CEO of the Trust for Governors Island. In January, 2016, Gina Pollara (AR’91) was named President of the Municipal Art Society of New York.