Bachelor of Interior Architecture

One of the few interior architecture programs in the nation located within an art school, the Bachelor of Interior Architecture (BIA) program explores light, color, materials, and movement through space and how these influence our relationships to people and the world around us.

The Bachelor of Interior Architecture (BIA) will no longer accept new students after Fall 2015.

The Bachelor of Interior Architecture (BIA) program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a set four-year curriculum. In the second through fourth years, interior architecture progressive design studios are the core of the BIA curriculum. Each class must be fulfilled by taking the class at SAIC or by transfer credit. Classes taken at other schools may not be equivalent in content or credit and might not be eligible for transfer or for only partial credit. Transfer credit is accepted only at the time of admission.

The Bachelor of Interior Architecture (BIA) will no longer accept new students after Fall 2015.

Total Credit Hours  126
Studio  12
  • CP 1010 Core Studio Practice I (3)
  • CP 1011 Core Studio Practice II (3)
  • CP 1020 Research Studio I (3)
  • CP 1022 Research Studio II (3)
  
Interior Architecture Studio Courses 60 
  • INARC 1001 Introduction to Interior Architecture (3)
  • INARC 1002 Design Drawing (3)
  • INARC 1004 Design Communication (3)
  • INARC 2001 Undergrad Studio 1 (6)
  • INARC 2002 Undergrad Studio 2 (6)
  • INARC 2003 Light and Space (3)
  • INARC 2014 Matter and Material (3)
  • INARC 2900 / SOPHSEM 2900 Design Thinking (3)
  • INARC 3021 Undergrad Studio 3 (6)
  • INARC 3900 / PROFPRAC 3900 Undergrad Studio 4 (6)
  • INARC 4021 Undergrad Studio 5 (6)
  • INARC 4011 Construction and Design (3)
  • INARC 4900 / CAPSTONE 4900 Undergrad Studio 6 (6)
  • AIADO 4932 Unwrapping Design (3)

    PROFPRAC and CAPSTONE are now required for new incoming students beginning in the 2015-16 academic year.

  
Art History   18
  • ARTHI 1001 World Cultures/Civilizations: Pre-History to 19th Century Art and Architecture (3)
  • Art History Elective at 1000 level (3)
  • ARTHI 2501 History of Space (3)
  • ARTHI 3438 Global Architecture (3)
  • Art History Electives (6)
  
Liberal Arts   30
  • ENGLISH 1001 First Year Seminar I (3)
  • ENGLISH 1005 First Year Seminar II (3)
  • Natural Science (6)
  • Social Science (6)
  • Humanities (3)
  • ARCH/INARC 4056 Architectural Theory (3)
  • Liberal Arts Electives (6)
  
General Electives  6

Transfer Students

Total credits required for minimum residency: 66
Minimum Studio credit: 42

 

 

The program is a set, four-year curriculum that recognizes that the study of human habitation and experience is a lifelong undertaking and critically essential to achieving a new balance in the way we live.

Students interested in rethinking how we build, inhabit, and transform our environment explore ideas about materials and construction with sustainability as a goal. Studio work reconfigures new definitions of habitation integrated with complex biological, technological, and cultural systems. You will negotiate between the natural, the artificial, and systems of global development and develop an ethical imagination in working in the public sphere.