Calendar

January 18 - 21, 2022

“Studio of the Future: The Charrette” week begins with a virtual kick-off event on Tuesday, January 18th, at 12:00 pm! During the event, you’ll hear from the team who worked so hard to organize this effort and learn more about what to expect as the week progresses. Join the meeting via the “COAD Studio Design Charrette” Microsoft Teams Channel.

The charrette will have a role in shaping architectural and design discourse and practice as we move into our 2022 strategic planning effort. It is meant to be a challenge to normative thinking. Our role is to question, redefine, and reshape the studio culture in our College.

What is a charrette?

The word charrette is French for “cart” or “chariot.” Its use in the sense of design and planning arose in the 19th century at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris, where it was not unusual at the end of a term for teams of student architects to work right up until a deadline, when a charrette would be wheeled among them to collect up their scale models and other work for review. The furious continuation of their work to apply the finishing touches came to be referred to as working en charrette, “in the cart.” The term evolved into the current design-related usage in conjunction with working right up until a deadline.

While the structure of a charrette varies, depending on the design problem and the individuals in the group, charrettes often take place in multiple sessions in which the group divides into subgroups. Each subgroup then presents its work to the full group as material for further dialogue. Such charrettes serve as a way of quickly generating a design solution while integrating the aptitudes and interests of a diverse group of people. The general idea of a charrette is to create an innovative atmosphere in which a diverse group of stakeholders can collaborate to “generate visions for the future.”