A wide shot of a ceramics studio, featuring students working with pottery wheels and other tools.

Charles Pipal

Professor, Adjunct

Bio

Education: Bachelor of Landscape Architecture, 1986, and Master of Architecture, 1990, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Concurrent positions: Principal architect, Charles Pipal AIA; Chair, Riverside Preservation Commission.

Personal Statement

Professor Pipal's areas of academic and professional expertise include documentation of historic buildings and sites, historic resource surveys, adaptive reuse of historic buildings, permit review and construction project management. His personal and scholastic interests include historic site interpretation as it applies to tourism and the understanding of the role of social and political history as it is seen and expressed in the built environment.

Courses

Title Department Catalog Term

Description

This 6-credit (two day) design studio is an opportunity for summative, integrated undergraduate work in architecture. Teaching leads students through theoretical and historical precedent; site research; and program analysis, to a design proposal that addresses contemporary issues in the built environment with a focus on architecture and how it serves the public. Students are expected to produce comprehensive design proposals that respond to topical briefs put forward by their teacher; incorporate knowledge from areas of architectural practice such as preservation, interior design, or urbanism; and that respond to specific, contemporary challenges and opportunities in the built environment such as sustainability, public space, or the impacts of advanced technology. Class work includes precedent studies and site analysis, site visits, and preparation and presentation of a design proposal. At the conclusion of the semester, students participate in the Studio Show, an exhibition of capstone work organized by faculty and students in the department's gallery. This course requires 12 credits of Architecture Practice Studio to register. This course requires students to have a laptop that meets SAIC's minimum hardware specifications and runs the department software template including Rhino and Revit.

Class Number

2136

Credits

6

Description

Intermediate design studio requires the design of a building responding to substantially qualitative interior space program, including building skins, systems, sustainability, accessibility, and life safety. Course Goals and Objectives 1) Learn pre-design, visual communication of concept and program diagramming, , systems and object integration during research into client organizations and the design of effective environments. 2) Bring technical knowledge and skills to bear on a design including structural and other building systems, accessibility, sustainability, and site design.

Case studies, readings and research will be project specific and determined through the programs defined in the studio.

The studio work is cumulative. The work addresses professional criteria and develops though milestones that culminate in a final portfolio and review for the course.

Class Number

1962

Credits

6

Description

Thesis studio asks students to determine and research an original problem with pertinent issues, and design an innovative response to some aspect of architectural production.

Course Goals and Objectives
1) Give individual students the opportunity to discover, define, and research a significant aspect of architectural production in depth.
2) Develop a personal approach to an important issue of contemporary significance to the field of architecture and communicate it concisely.
3) Work with originality, clarity, and high production values at the end of an architectural education.

Class Number

2481

Credits

6