(bright music) - "Eye on Education," I'm Fred Martino.

This week, an area of study that impacts all of us, architecture.

SIU Carbondale has undergraduate and graduate degrees in the field.

Today, we'll learn more about those programs.

We'll find out how environmental design is more important than ever, and we'll hear some thoughts on form as well as function from an expert.

I am so pleased to have with us Craig Anz.

He is SIU's director of Graduate Studies in Architecture.

Craig, thank you so much for being here.

- Thank you for inviting me.

- It is good to have you here today, and you know, I want to just start with the basics.

I mentioned that the architecture programs at SIU include both undergraduate and graduate programs.

Tell me about those.

- Well, school of Architecture is actually composed of fashion studies, which includes fashion styling, design, and merchandising, and we also have interior design.

We have a minor in construction management.

We have architectural studies program, which is a pre-professional degree in design.

And we have our architectural master's, which is actually the only IPAL in the state, which is integrated pathway to licensure for our master's professional program.

- Okay, so a lot of different areas.

People may be surprised to hear that, 'cause I think when they think of architecture, they think of one thing.

They think of buildings and how buildings look on the outside, but as you mentioned, you even have in the undergraduate area, interior design and fashion design in your series of programs.

And then the actual license to become a licensed architect is actually a graduate program, a master's degree.

- It's what's required at the national level to have the master degree, and that goes with the National Council for Architectural Registration Boards, which is our national service.

- Very interesting, so give us a little better understanding of some of the undergraduate programs, the kind of things that folks learn, and you know, how those programs prepare you, and I'm guessing some folks don't move on to the master's program.

Some may go to another type of a program down the line.

- You know, what's really interesting is that a pre-professional degree in architecture, which is literally a design degree, and sometimes we call it environmental design, which is what my undergraduate degree is.

It includes everything from gaming design, set design, CG in movies, all the way up into urban planning and civil engineering and other things that other fields go into.

So yeah, not everyone goes onto the master's of architecture to get that license, but they go into other fields.

In fact, every time you see a movie where you've got really cool cities in the background, those are usually architectural background designers doing it, and that's a real big niche for architecture right now.

- Very interesting.

So tell me about students who excel in architecture.

I assume that math and problem solving skills are really key.

- Yeah, so you usually have a calculus level, mathematics and architecture.

We do do it with dynamic structures, thermodynamics with environmental design and energy efficiency in design.

So we're really good at that area, but we're also, I come from, I say my background is environmental design, but my master's in PhD are in environmentalism and urban design, so we're dealing with large problems, the 21st century challenges, and we know that some 65 or 75% of the population of the future will be living in cities.

And then we're seeing changes in those cities in equity, which are big issues we're dealing with, environmental interfacing, new forms of transportation that we're having to design for, and so we're dealing with what we call complex or multidimensional problem solving, and we do a lot of urban design and community development in our program.

And we'll talk about it a little bit that later, I think, with our community transformation work, which we're dealing with is something akin to design sciences, which is called Wicked Problem Solving.

So we believe in problems that are multidimensional and often do not have solid singular dimensional answers.

And so we're dealing with these fourth generation type multidimensional problems.

- So you really have to, when you get into this field, be ready to tackle things that are very complex, and be prepared for that.

- Well, you know, what's amazing is our students, by the time that they're in their senior year, are game changers, and they're amazing people who are just naturally thinking that direction.

And our current seniors right now are just, every day surprise me.

They just, when you ask for one thing, they give you five more things that they know have to be solved in relationship to the problem at hand.

- You mentioned the students.

How has the student population changed in the program over time?

You've been doing this a long time.

- We're seeing our populations change in diversity automatically.

You know, we often ask about diversity, equity, and inclusion, but our program program is dealing with complex problems, so you're dealing with people with multiple answers, and so we're starting to see increased diversity happening within our problem solving just naturally, right?

Because the communities we service as architects are diverse communities.

We're starting to see people come from the communities that we work with.

We're starting to see a larger percentage of, for instance, Hispanic students in our program coming from Chicago, and they're our best students.

I mean, they're amazing people coming from urban fabrics, and they're ready to change the world, and they know that's what our problems are about.

We consider ourselves a transformative and revisionary profession, and they come in, they're rock stars.

- That's great, and coming from Chicago, seeing a lot of different types of architecture, And a great town to see architecture, right?

- One of the best, yeah.

- Yeah, that's really great.

Well, you mentioned environmental design.

This is an area of expertise for you, but also an area that more and more students need to be thinking about.

It's so important, not only for, there's a demand for it, but important to the planet.

How has this changed the program at SIU?

- Well, we've always been grounded in environmental design, and that environmental design doesn't, it is not just ecologies and our biological interface, but it deals with social interfaces, for instance, and economic interfaces, right?

So we're having to do with, you know, the surplus of money has to be available for any form of architecture urban planning, so we're having to deal with those issues in complex.

So our environmental design is really multi-faceted, so we see it as energy solving.

We see it as equity solving.

We're seeing large percentage of migrations of people coming into cities that are culturally different that are now sharing spaces, so that environmental problem is always multifaceted, and that's why it's always been rooted in environmental design from the beginning, and then the outcome of that is the built environment.

And we often say this kind of a Buckminster Fuller approach, the best forms of design are invisible, because the best ones work without you knowing that they're there, right?

So you know, cell phones have just merged into society.

We don't even notice them anymore, and they're phenomenal designs, but our cities work the same way.

The best forms of it, you don't even notice because they work so well.

- Very interesting.

Well, despite advances in building for efficiency, it's very interesting to me that there are still many homes and other structures that are out there that are built without even the simplest of improvements like very robust insulation, which today through technology, can be done so much better than in the past.

Solar power, we're seeing more of it, but it's still, it's not ubiquitous in construction, even though the technology is there and it can be used in so many areas and generate a lot of power.

How do you think this can change, ensuring that new buildings include basics like this?

- Well, for sure we're having to do this in our profession anyway, so a lot of our model energy codes are now working to our benefit.

Architects are working within those areas for energy efficiency in buildings.

We have to meet certain standards.

We're also starting to see in certain areas where we're having to build ahead of time for disaster resilience as well, so those have to be built into the architecture.

I think what you're seeing in a lot of cases, fast production building by developers, which is kind of going untethered, and it's happening in places where maybe they're not following the code properly, we're already seeing like in southern Illinois or people building in the floodplain, which you're really not supposed to do.

So when there's architecture involved, they're the code official.

They're the ones holding everything to the standards and the best practices for what we're supposed to do.

So we're starting to see changes in that, where they're holding people to that accountability.

Until that happens within the industry where there's fast production, you know, template design and housing, you're gonna see more of that, and until they're really held to that accountability.

- Do you think that the answer to ensuring that when folks go and purchase, especially a new home or even a business purchasing new construction, do you think the answer might be more regulation to actually improve those standards and then the enforcement, so the folks who inspect and make sure that what is required in the law, whether it be an R factor for insulation or some kind of other technology, that it's being done?

- We have to hold it to the standard first, the regulation first, and it's one thing to build one home, but when you build 4,000 of them in one setting, then it multiplies the problem.

So yes, they have to be held to that standard, and yes, there has to be a greater levels of inspection and follow through on that, because the sheer amount of multiplying that across fabrics, and so you know, I mean, they have to be held to that.

And I think we're starting to see changes in that when, and there need to be changes in how insurance is involved as well, so like when there's a disaster, the insurance pays to put it back the way it was instead of saying how could we have done it better, right?

So I think that's one aspect of design that has to be put back in is we should be revising our methods, not just repeating something we know was in harm's way or vulnerable.

- Okay, very interesting.

I have seen buildings not only designed for energy efficiency, but also constructed with things like rooftop gardens and ways to capture rainwater, particularly important issues in the West where many people have been seeing, you know, very severe effect from a mega drought in the West.

- Well, along what we're talking about, and when we're talking about green roofs and you know, that kind of, I guess, it falls on what we call performative landscapes, and so it doesn't matter if it's on a roof, or it's your front lawn, or it's a park.

I mean, remember, Millennial Park is a rooftop garden, because there's one big parking garage underneath it, right?

So it's back to that ubiquitous design.

You don't even realize that that it is one big green roof.

- That's in Chicago, correct, yes.

- I've been there.

- Which is a phenomenal, it's an amazing park, right?

And so, which also is performative, right?

So but in the West in particular, you're starting to see where they're holding people to rainwater collection and cistern, right?

And you're also holding 'em to zeroscaping, where you're putting in landscape that is natural and doesn't require that level of watering, you know?

When they start putting in lawns to try to look like a Boston area, you know, green space, you know, then that's problematic in areas, places like Arizona, or try to maintain the golf courses out there, right?

So you start to see more and more of this kind of water retrieval systems, which we do what's called ecosystem resourcing, where we look at the performative value of a landscape on how much water it can hold, how much it can shed, how much is going into plants.

We use bioswells and other mechanisms to do that, and we're looking at how we interface with those areas as well.

This also includes our interfaces along conservation areas, wetlands.

We know that wetlands now are worth more than urban spaces, especially during a flood, because they're capturing a lot of water that would've gone into your urban areas and cause damage.

So we're starting to use these to our benefit in what we basically call performative landscapes.

- Very interesting, and the technology keeps changing.

I mean, it is amazing to me some of the things that are being developed right now.

In thinking about getting a chance to talk to you today, I just happened by chance to be watching a television newscast, and there was a story about a technology I wasn't even aware of, which is becoming more and more common that I would imagine architects have to think about called smart windows, and how they are becoming more and more common in buildings where, and I wasn't even aware of this technology.

Can you talk about that, the notion of the idea that you can have windows that help block the sun automatically?

- We're starting to see whole buildings that are done in smart systems, so you have your windows which can change.

We have windows that are starting to use nanotechnologies where they can change by just changing the temperature or the electric current that goes through it and it'll change it.

You're starting to see people use things like aerogel, which is a material that has very little thermal transmission capacity, but it's absolutely clear, right?

So you start to see these a lot.

We used it in, well, I worked over in Qatar for a while, and they were using it on installation panels to increase his capacity for thermal resistance.

- Very interesting.

- So you're starting to see a lot of these smart systems happening, and crossover to like, for instance, with fashion, we're starting to see wearable technologies.

So when people enter buildings, it starts adjusting the thermostat and other things based upon your needs and temperature.

And you start to see that as critically with health and COVID that you're maybe starting to wear, to have a smart system around you that are aware of your body temperature and every area aspect about you.

And so there's not just the windows, it's the flooring systems now have conductive systems in them.

The wall systems do it, you name it.

They're becoming smart systems.

And we're starting to see smart planning happening along the same lines where this translates to self-driving cars and other things within our environments which are working for us.

- And they really can make a difference.

I mean, this particular story I saw where they showed these windows where they're hooked into the system in the home, the electric system, and they know when the sun is brighter to make the window darker so that the home doesn't get as hot.

And the story claimed that it could save 20% on the air conditioning bill just by having this window.

And then conversely in the wintertime, when you want to let that sunlight in to warm up the home, so you're not using as much heat, it does that too.

- Yeah, we have a couple of terms we use.

One is called biomimicry, where we, you know, this is also an environmental design term where we want buildings to be start acting like biological systems, where like say, a lizard that raises its skin ever so slightly to allow air to flow over it.

So there are certain materials that are phase change material that will open up when they're heated to allow for that airflow to happen.

And then there's window systems that also do the same thing.

They're phase change materials, right?

- So energy, environmental design, these are all things that we're hearing more and more about.

They're becoming more and more common.

Unfortunately, other things that's become very common in the last couple of years is inflation, and I wanna address this, because I have personal experience working, learning about a construction project that due to recent inflation, the cost of that project has gone up an estimated 30 to 40%.

So essentially, architects were told go back to the drawing board and scale this down, because what we had originally hoped to do, we can't afford any longer.

How can, you know, educational programs prepare students for these kinds of enormous challenges when you're working in the field?

- For sure, in our minor in particular with the construction safety, we have estimating courses in there and project management courses which deal with new materials, right?

So we do have some materials now that are coming into the market that can reduce that cost.

We also know that like for instance, our predecessors had to have a lot of decoration on their buildings.

We're starting to remove a lot of that and be much more, the building is becoming more and more performative machine where we live, right?

A smart system, and less an ornamented box, as we say, right?

And the other side of it is that, as I was saying earlier, is that all architecture, urban design requires surplus of income or surplus of economy or the anticipation of it.

And so we know that we're designing buildings now that over a large period of time that it's taken out via a loan or whatever it may be, if we can get a building to be more effective and efficient over time, then it has a return of investment in the long run.

So if we can get buildings to use less energy and cost less to operate, costs less to maintain over a lifespan, over a life cycle of buildings, then the return of investment, say five, 10 years down the line reduces that cost, right?

We're also seeing that, you know, especially we've talked about housing and material costs.

We're already seeing that building housing in like, isolated areas is not to anyone's benefit anymore.

So we're starting to see mixed use, mixed income developments mixed with amenities and revenue generating economies like restaurants, offices, and other things within proximity, so people drive less, they spend less on their gas, they have more money left over for leisure at the end, especially when things are within proximity of them, they live healthier lives, right?

So that's another thing we're trying to do in cities is create healthier environments so that, you know, you use less energy and your air's cleaner, right?

So we know in Chicago, one of our faculty members, Mehdi Ashayeri, is determining health factors in the city of Chicago, and the people in the areas where air quality is bad, they're also paying more for their electricity bills because they can't open their windows for, you know, fresh air, you know, natural ventilation and other things that they would've had.

So it's an interesting correlation between those things.

So we always look at the long-term value, right?

Return investment for our clients, and we do teach that within our program, particularly in the construction management, but we also have it in our pro practice cores and in our systems classes as well.

- It's interesting in that last question, you noted that with many of the other changes, in general, buildings are becoming less ornate, however, aesthetics is still part of architecture, and there is a beauty in sometimes the simple design and the design that may not necessarily be ornate, but has a natural aesthetic quality through its design.

Tell me about this in your program, and how you help students get their own style in terms of the aesthetics they like to bring to their work.

- So you know, on top of the kind of complex problem solving, which is, you know, ask more complex questions about a problem, I'm also a big fan of Warren Berger who says ask more beautiful questions, right?

And so often, we get into our problems, like right now, we're working on a competition for a spiritual space, and we're asking the question, you know, what is this that separates this from how other spaces operate, you know?

How do we create places where people feel bliss, where people feel delight, right?

And beyond the commodity of the building itself, right?

So we know a lot of modern architecture and modern art has extraordinary aesthetic qualities without having to have an application on it called decoration.

The spatial capacities themselves are where the beauty lies.

- And sometimes even the material, right?

I mean, I've noticed that on what I would call modern buildings, buildings that may be, you know, full of a lot of windows, and they may not be ornate, but they have little touches like a panel with wood or a panel with metal that really adds a unique look to the home, and even the windows themselves may add some, you know, particular style to the home.

- Ms. Vonderau used say God is in the details, so it's how you handle it.

But we also know that part of the aesthetics of a place is, like I said, is a spatial thing, and so we know that that creating positive interactions between people is also a form of beauty, and so creating great public spaces in cities, like I said, it becomes backdrop, and people don't realize that they're living beautiful lives, right?

- Well, let's talk about people.

I know the architecture program has been involved in what you call community transformation initiatives.

Tell me about those.

- Well, big emphasis in our program, and like I said, urban design and community development, all of our faculty so some form of research and work in this area, you know, and we teach it in our fourth year studio.

We teach it in our regional studio where we look at what we call grand challenges.

You know, the kind of, you know, how communities, how big problems can be solved, you know, through design.

And so we've been working with communities here since I arrived here in 2004, you know, in various ways.

I'm on Carbondale Main Street board, and you know, kudos to Carbondale Main Street, because they do a lot of things in the downtown that people don't even realize they do, and so they do amazing work down there.

We also work with some communities here that have been flooded, right?

So you know, like Olive Branch in Alexander County, we worked with a transformational project down there where it was part of a FEMA buyout project, but we were also trying to say how a community could rebuild in durable and resilient ways and form great relationships?

Our most current project has been in Venice, Brooklyn, and Madison of Metro East St. Louis, and we had Ed Hightower, one of our board trustee members, and we developed a great collaboration between SIUE, their successful communities collaborative up there.

Kudos these guys as well.

They've been phenomenal to work with, Connie Spurlock, and these ones up there, Courtney Breckenridge.

We've formed immediate great relationship with these guys.

And so what starts off with a simple summer studio supported by Illinois Innovation Network grant, which is small amount of money, has turned into millions of dollars worth of infrastructure and upgrades for a community already moving in that direction.

And so it's a small momentum to generate ideas and images of how communities could work, and people start getting on board.

So we hope that continues, and we hope to keep our foot in the door and build long, really lasting relationships, not just with our communities, but with SIUE.

I can't stress, you know, the importance of collaboration.

We can solve great things together, right?

- Yeah.

So in a larger way, this is really in interesting to me.

Connected to some of the community transformation work that you are doing in your program, there has been some research that I'm sure you've seen and folks watching this show have seen that indicates students in general today are interested in making a difference through their work.

So they're interested in environmental and social justice issues.

Those are particularly important to them.

Are you seeing this as a professor today that more students are about, yeah?

- Yeah, so right now, we have a student going to Dominican Republic for spring break who's working kind of a mission work down there, but it's also building, right?

So you know, they see them making a difference in communities in where they go.

We have another student who's joined the AmeriCorps right after the study, and I couldn't be more proud of her.

And so you know, we've got some really great people, and for their thesis, the common topic is how to fix something, how to revise something in a community.

So you're seeing these people, they know that what they're doing is gonna make a difference.

- Craig, send them our way.

They'll be on the next show.

- Yeah, they're already outdoing me.

- I can't wait to see some of the work that they've been doing.

Thank you for being here with us today.

- Oh, appreciate it, getting a good word out.

- Good to have you.

That is "Eye on Education."

My guest was Craig Anz.

He is SIU's director of Graduate Studies in Architecture.

For all of us at WSIU, I'm Fred Martino.

Thanks for being here, and have a great week.

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