Variants of Design Studio: A Phenomenographic Research on Students’ Conceptions of Design Studio Environment

Abstract

Especially in the last two decades, there has been a call for change in design studio education. Today, a growing body of unconventional studio teaching approaches is challenging the traditional design studio setting. Given the central role of the instructor in the design studio, each instructor adopts an approach according to their disposition on design and architecture, as well as to their view on education, and to some extent, they reflect their view in the design of their studio course. This also enables students to explore different approaches to design and architecture while exposing them to different pedagogical positions. This scenario, viewed from the students’ perspectives, raises two intriguing questions concerning studio education and the range of studio environments: (1) What is the range of studio teaching approaches embodied in design studios? (2) In what dimensions do they differ regarding students’ learning experiences? This paper is a phenomenographic research aiming to map the range of current studio environments from a pedagogical standpoint through students’ conceptions. For this purpose, we interviewed ten graduates from three architectural schools about their studio experiences. Through a phenomenographic analysis, we elicited four qualitatively different conceptions of studio environments. Further cross-category analysis revealed that the conceptions varied in several dimensional themes. The results provide insight from the student’s perspective on how studio environments are experienced. This information may contribute to our understanding of the studio environment, its underlying pedagogy, and how students experience learning.

Keywords

• Architectural design studio education
• Design studio pedagogy
• Design studio experience
• Student perspective
• Phenomenography

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