The Department of Architecture

The Department of Architecture offers dynamic engagement with a rich diversity of creativity and scholarship about the built environment. Guided by a distinguished international faculty prominent across the breadth of the field, students pursue design excellence on all levels.

Degree Programs

Master of Architecture I

The program leading to the Master of Architecture (MArch) is an accredited professional degree intended for individuals who have completed the bachelor’s degree with a major other than one of the design professions or with a pre-professional undergraduate major in one of the design professions.
Master of Architecture I AP

Individuals who have completed a pre-professional four-year Bachelor of Arts or Bachelor of Science degree with a major in architecture or environmental design may be eligible for admission with advanced standing, reducing the required course of study to two-and-one-half years.
Master of Architecture II

The program leading to the Master of Architecture II (MArch II) is a post-professional degree intended for individuals who have completed a five-year undergraduate professional program in architecture or its equivalent. This degree is not accredited by the National Architectural Accreditation Board (NAAB) and does not fulfill the education requirement for licensure in those jurisdictions adhering to the established requirements.

COMPARE DEGREE PROGRAMS

“Greetings from Cambridge, where today we celebrate more than 150 years of architectural education at Harvard. The Architecture department at Harvard GSD has prepared generations of dedicated graduates to lead in shaping the built environment. As new complexities emerge within the practice of architecture – from climate stress to AI, intense urbanization to rapid social change – today’s students continue our tradition by developing robust responses to timely and ever-emerging challenges.”

Grace E. La
Professor and Chair, Department of Architecture

Chair’s Welcome

INSIDE ARCHITECTURE

Collaboration and Studio Culture Design-Centered Curriculum Practice Learning Environment Leadership and Innovation

Faculty collaborate with visiting practitioners, critics, and theorists from around the world to bring students into engagement with pressing issues in contemporary architecture. We cultivate the skillful manipulation of form while drawing inspiration from a broad body of knowledge. A thorough grounding in arts and sciences, along with intelligence, vision, inventiveness, and social awareness, all are essential to achieving distinguished architecture.

Two students present drawings and architectural models in a final review of an option studio. — Students present architectural drawings in a studio class.

Two people viewing an architectural model in Druker Design Gallery. — Architectural models on display in Gund Hall’s Druker Design Gallery.

A comprehensive curriculum strengthens students’ understandings of the discipline while expanding the boundaries of the field. The department’s research-based instruction also encompasses design theory, visual studies, history, technology, and professional practice. The Harvard GSD’s diverse offerings, resources, and research initiatives expose students to technological, ecological, and social agendas, positioning design as a source of potential to transform the global quality of life and the future of human habitation.

Pier Paolo Tamburelli on the “hardscrabble, repressed, and perverted” American Gothic psyche.

With Mass Timber and the Scandinavian Effect, Jennifer Bonner and Hanif Kara speculate how wood might recapture the American architectural imagination.

Balanced between concept and realization, practice exposes the connection between design thinking and the space of operation, imagining methods that advance and intervene in the world. Practice is a design challenge in its own right, supported by innovative research and a wide range of courses on the proven and emerging ways in which the disciplines of design create impact in our rapidly changing technological, social, and environmental context. Led by Professor Elizabeth Bowie Christoforetti, who chairs the Practice Platform, the transdisciplinary group is comprised of faculty from all departments including Jeffry Burchard, Daniel D’Oca, Gareth Doherty, Adam Frampton, Jenny French, Gary Hilderbrand, Eric Höweler, Karen Janosky, Jungyoon Kim, Hanif Kara, Grace La, Dana McKinney White, Chris Reed, and Elizabeth Whittaker.

Photo of a model of a building — “Resolution Grounds: Designing with the Fragmented Survey” by Paris Bezanis (MArch I ’25)

Architectural rendering of a raised housing complex foregrounded by traditional Brooklyn area two story apartment building. — “Block Edit” by Chandler Caserta (MArch I ’25)

Our dynamic environment provides a foundation for design exploration and communication, offering students new ways to model buildings, access design references, and present ideas. The educational experience at the Harvard GSD is enriched and broadened by close interaction among the departments of Architecture, Landscape Architecture, and Urban Planning and Design, all of which work in a single, open space of the sunlit “trays.” A shared culture of mutual respect maintains an atmosphere in which studio instruction, creative production, and a free exchange of ideas can thrive. A wide range of resources at Harvard University, and throughout the Boston area, are richly supplemented by a robust departmental lecture program: nearly all Pritzker Prize-winning architects have spoken at the GSD, many before they were awarded this honor.

Image of light-filled Gund Hall trays — The Trays in Gund Hall are a collaborative and creative learning environment.

Students, faculty, and visitors gather in Gund Hall's courtyard. — Students, faculty, and visitors gather in Gund Hall’s courtyard.

As new ways of thinking emerge within the profession, demands on design grow increasingly complex and require new interpretation. Architects draw upon knowledge and experience gained from the past while adapting to the changing needs of the modern world, leading to innovations in design and building. The Harvard GSD has prepared generations of dedicated graduates for leadership in shaping the built environment. Today’s Architecture students continue in this tradition by applying their learning from the GSD toward the urgent design challenges of contemporary societies and the global future.