Utopias, Camps, and the Architecture of War, is proposed as a research- design workshop that examines the layered histories of Terezín as a way to think critically about how architecture participates in the making of trauma, memory, and recovery. Conceived as a fortified utopian city and later transformed into a Nazi transport camp, Terezín embodies the shifting functions of urban space and architecture as both agent and witness. Its bastions, mounds, and urban fabric are not merely remnants but active carriers of political and historical meaning. By tracing the trajectory from fortification to camp, from architecture of war to the ongoing dilemmas of inhabitation, memorialization, restoration and reconstruction, this workshop foregrounds the ethical and epistemological challenges of engaging with sites where architecture itself was complicit in violence.

This workshop class is offered as collaborative project together with: Czech Technical University in Prague, Czech Republic (lead by Veronika Sindlerova); TU Liberec, Czech Republic (lead by Radek Kolarik,  Iva Dvorakova) TU Dresden, Germany (lead by Angela Mensing-de Jong); Technion -Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel (lead by Eliyahu Keller, Aaron Sprecher).

The class will sponsor (flights & accommodation) a trip to the Czech Republic to take place between October 7/8 – 14, 2026 (exact dates tbc), including participation in a conference and exhibition in Terezin during Oct. 12-13,  of ongoing studies undertaken on this subject by our collaborating universities. During this trip the MIT class will interact with students from all the collaborating schools mentioned above and work together with the students & researchers from the Technion in conducting field research, developing narratives, and learning first-hand the physical and historical conditions that have shaped the town of Terezin. 

6/29/26 note: schedule change to M 2-5

Detail is tricky. Despite its ubiquity, it remains underappreciated as a site of political, historical, and aesthetic meaning. It is elusive, often strange, and strung between opposites. It can be necessary or excessive, graphic or tectonic, honest or dishonest —often both. This course investigates various lineages of architectural detail, encouraging students to appreciate the 1:1 as an important scale of intention and invention in our discipline. Lectures and assignments will equip students in noticing the attitudes and sensibilities which emanate from the steps, sills, corners and eaves around them, and developing their own. Drawing on this cultivated awareness, the final project will allow students to experiment with a way of designing buildings that begins at the scale of the hand.

Undergraduates welcome.