The Atelier provides the advanced knowledge and the design skills needed to complete the education of an architect: such a knowledge is acquired within the Atelier and through a series of mono-disciplinary or multi-disciplinary lectures, both on theoretical and practical issues, relevant to the design themes. The progress in knowledge and understanding will be assessed through mid-term and final evaluations during the Atelier, also with the contribution of guest experts from practice and industry, paying particular attention to the students’ capability to integrate the various disciplines contributing to it. In the experience of this Atelier, the understanding of the complex phenomena that govern building production, both in its constructive and urban components, occurs through the in-depth analysis of the specific design theme. A multi-disciplinary approach will provide knowledge about the complexity of the context of the design proposal. Interpreting the complex contexts in which the practice of architecture takes place today involves interacting with different specialisms and carrying out individual research able to connect design, history, and the knowledge of the building elements in architecture. The design experience of the Atelier aims primarily to train the ability to independently manage a complex architectural project through the mastery of techniques and methods specific to the job of the architect. This means analysing complex and non-univocal information and interpreting them into a shared decision-making process. It also asks for the ability to exert leadership in a necessarily multi-disciplinary design team, dealing with the social and public practices involved in the process. The experience of the Atelier, characterized by intense experimentation, entails a partial simulation of effective design practices in the real world, also from the point of view of time management. Students are therefore required to complete the project at the end of the semester. Processing a complex architectural project in a given time represents a specific ability of the work of the architect: this will be verified at the exam that will take place, as usual, during the first week of exams, in the first review session consecutive to the Atelier.

The basic critical and design skills, along with the concepts and introductory tools in technology of architecture are assumed to have been acquired during the Disciplinary Courses and the Design Ateliers of the three-year Degree in ‘Sciences of Architecture’ or in equivalent undergraduate experiences.

This Atelier aims to develop the students' capability to deal with complex mixed-use programs in urban areas, addressing the tangled problems their transformation often propose at different scales, from urban integration to the constructive solutions. Students will be asked to address a project engaging experimentally with: _mixed-typologies and uses; _public and semi-public spaces; _best management practices; _carbon neutral strategies; _sustainable design; _renewable technologies. Particular attention will be payed to innovation in light and dry construction and in envelopes, a strategic aspect of sustainable design. Collaborations with most innovative companies are set by means of lectures, onsite visits and short workshops. The technologies offer a wide support to advanced architectural practices and recent industry undertakings will be at the centre of the teaching experience both from the technical and architectural viewpoints. Students will design and prototype an innovative facade component: _In collaboration with leading industrial partners, in order to shape the material and component properties and the production workflow. _Both into the class and the shop floor, with construction drawings, instruction in production techniques, BIM, and Computer Aided Manufacturing. Lectures and studio work will be integrated by field trips to a construction site, product manufacturers, and the shop floor.

This Atelier aims to improve individual abilities and, together, promote collaboration by a ‘competitive-cooperative’ method, which means an alternate proliferation of personal proposals and group elaboration of the most fitting ones. In other words, students will work out individually the solutions selected at each step in critics and tutorials, regardless of whether they proposed them or not. It is a way to get a more intense design experience and to anticipate the workflow of a typical practice. This studio aims to work as an exchange environment, with a constant ‘peer review’ approach. This means that the whole activities will lean on the participation of students in critics and lectures. ‘Having words’ is a prerequisite to getting involved in these discussions; theoretical issues play therefore a crucial role and will be addressed in the whole studio development.

Students are expected to fully engage in the studio’s approach and aims, to attend lectures and field experiences provided by the Atelier, to partake regularly in individual discussions and collective critics, upgrading their projects according to the tasks assigned, and to spend significant time beyond the classroom time, working out the topics addressed and their design proposals. The studio requires the students a two-part assignment. ASSIGNMENT 1 The first studio stint will approach the project area by means of a sequence of exercises able to approach the complexity of the design processes from different viewpoints: _Program, or the array of uses thought of as able to give life to the project area. _Context, or the local constraints and opportunities that give sense to the project. _State of the art, or the previous experiences able to guide the interpretation of existing conditions and the strategies for their transformation. _Three-dimensional imagination, or the translation into specific, possible architectural settings of the information collected according to the previous issues. Rapid individual projects will test the complexity of the design processes according to those different approaches. Case study analysis will provide precious guidelines to perform the exercises’ tasks. _Part 1 (4-5 weeks; individual and team work; 1/1000; 1/500; 1:200). Students will work out four rapid design exercises: 1. Inside-out. A first, abstract organisation of the program will be manipulated and adapted to the site features. 2. Outside-in. The second exercise shifts the vantage point in order to include a bigger picture. 3. Inside-in. A more detailed scale will take care of the typological-functional features of the buildings and offer clues to improve the solutions proposed in previous exercises. 4. Outside-out. Proposals about envelopes and surfaces, of buildings and the in-between spaces, will conclude this first collection of design experiments. _Part 2 (2-3 weeks; team and individual work; 1/1000; 1/500; 1:200). Each group will elaborate a synthesis of the different schemes and insights produced in the first part. Those overall solutions will be discussed in a mid-term review with external critics. ASSIGNMENT 2 Students will choose a significant part of their projects in order to work out an in-depth design of its constructive features, with special attention to the envelope in relation to the immediate site conditions, as a mediator between the building interior and the public space. This assignment will develop high-performance envelope systems. The industrial partner will assist students in designing innovative modelling to achieve the desired pattern, texture, coating, and colour, and to get the necessary performance about sun-shading, minimization of heat exchange, visual permeability, protection of privacy, etc. BIM and CAM technologies will help to devise the manufacturing of an envelope component with rapid and energy efficient offsite construction strategies. _Part 3 (7 weeks; team and individual work; 1/50, 1/20, 1/1, and back to architectural scales). Architectural design of one building or a portion of a building, with a specific attention to the construction technologies. This latter approach must be dealt with, for the exam, at least by the following drawings: 1. In orthographic projection a) full section from basement to roof, b) portions of the elevation, and c) the plan at 1/50 scale. The three orthographic projections should match: an element or object should be clearly readable in all the three views in section, elevation, and plan. E.g. a window is shown in its true relationship between section, elevation, and plan. The table must include a (small) navigator, highlighting the sectioned portion of the building in plan and elevation, and pointing to the North direction. 2. Details at 1/20 scale of the main nodes of the envelope, e.g. roof- façade; interstory of the façade including opening/s; ground-basement. Highlight the details in the section at scale 1/50. 3. Portion of an isometric-section view of the envelope. 4. References, e.g. to materials or techs used or case-projects. Further design drawings will include a critical reconsideration of the overall project according to the information collected in the detail exploration.

Corbellini, Giovanni, Sayable Space: Narrative Practices in Architecture (Siracusa: LetteraVentidue, 2021). Corbellini, Giovanni, Ex Libris: 16 Keywords of Contemporary Architecture (Siracusa: LetteraVentidue, 2019). Corbellini, Giovanni, Dr. Corbellini’s Pills (Siracusa: LetteraVentidue, 2016). Lawson, Mark, Ray Ogden, and Chris Goodier, Design in modular construction (Boca Raton: CRC Press, 2014). This Is Hybrid: An analysis of mixed-use buildings, ed. by Aurora Fernández Per, Javier Mozas, Javier Arpa (Vitoria-Gasteiz: a+t, 2014) Watts, Andrew: Modern construction envelopes (Basel: Birkhäuser, 2014). Picon, Antoine, Ornament: The Politics of Architecture and Subjectivity (Chichester: Wiley, 2013). Bizley, Graham, Architecture in detail II (London: Routledge, 2010). Lovell, Jenny, Building Envelopes: An Integrated Approach (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2010). Detail, Journal published by Institut für internationale Architektur-Dokumentation GmbH.

Exam: Compulsory oral exam; Individual project; Group project;

Fully attendance and positive participation in lectures, seminars, and further activities of the Atelier are preconditions to access the assessment. The final exam will take place in the first week of the examination session consecutive to the Atelier. In case the final design work is not completed on time or is judged inadequate or incomplete, the student may submit the final project in a further examination session. The final grade will consider also the student's ability to develop a complex architectural design in a given time. The final evaluation will be individual and will use the available range of marks. It will be carried out through discussion with the Atelier’s professors and considering carefully the studio central experience and its project activities. The group or individual project will provide a starting mark that the oral exam can confirm, improve or reduce (+/- 40%). Specific activities undertook during the studio and their outcomes (written texts, presentations, and the likes) will contribute to the final grade. The student's attitude to synthesize and bring together in the project what acquired from the different disciplines of the Atelier is considered a background value. Assessment criteria 1. INVESTIGATION OF THE PROJECT Evaluating the ability to analyse and to interpret the physical and social context of the project through original elaborations. Evaluating the ability to manage the complexity of the information provided by the teachers and proposed by the student, and to interpret the architectural context. Guiding Criteria: _Reading and synthesis. _Interpretation and critical processing _Awareness of construction technologies and their architectural aims. _Integration of these issues in the design results. 2. CONCEPTUALIZATION Evaluating the ability to conceptualize an argued proposal as a strategic answer to the identified problems. Evaluating the ability to describe the general aspects of the project and its feasibility in relation to ordinary practices. Guiding Criteria: _Clarity of proposal. _Vision. _Connection with design references. _Autonomy in the elaboration of the proposal. 3. ARCHITECTURAL DEVELOPMENT OF PROJECT AND RESULTS Evaluating the ability to develop, within available time, a coherent project through a spiralling process (development, discussion, feedback). Evaluating the quality of the final result and its consistency with the design process. Guiding Criteria: _Critical capacity and self-criticism. _Adaptation to the feedback of the reviews. _Completeness and quality of the final results. 4. COMMUNICATION Evaluating the ability to represent and transmit the project at all stages of the learning experience, employing the appropriate scales of representation in order to control and direct the construction. Evaluating the ability to communicate in innovative ways the specific aspects of different disciplines and their integration into the project. Guiding Criteria: _Conscious use of presentation tools. _Effectiveness of public presentation and discussion. _Theoretical awareness. 5. DISCIPLINARY CONTRIBUTIONS Evaluating the ability to identify disciplinary issues in a relevant way according to the proposed project case. Evaluating the ability to intercept a complex design theme using cross-fertilization of knowledge. Evaluating the capability to represent in detail a project aimed to construction. Guiding Criteria: _Evolution of knowledge in the Atelier’s disciplines. _Disciplinary relevance of individual contributions in the project. _Integration of disciplines at different scales.

In addition to the message sent by the online system, students with disabilities or Specific Learning Disorders (SLD) are invited to directly inform the professor in charge of the course about the special arrangements for the exam that have been agreed with the Special Needs Unit. The professor has to be informed at least one week before the beginning of the examination session in order to provide students with the most suitable arrangements for each specific type of exam.