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For architecture students: design ideas, materials, thesis topics and a podcast

If you are studying architecture, this page gathers what Mu.S.Ex. has to offer you: built projects to learn from, materials and colours to borrow for a moodboard, research questions that make good thesis topics, and Design Dialogues, a podcast series on studying and practising architecture in India.

Everything here comes from real work: projects we designed, research our team carried out, and conversations recorded with architects, professors and students.

Design ideas and case studies

Six projects, each with one idea worth studying. Open a project for its drawings, process pictures and photographs.

Moodboard references: materials, colours and light

Materials, colours and methods taken from the same projects, for building a moodboard or a materials palette.

Corbett House

Materials
Reused brick and masonry, local timber, bamboo, branches and logs
Colour and light
Earth tones, with low warm light that throws patterned shadows across beams and walls
Method
Old walls taken down and reused; screens, beds, fences and lamps made by hand on site; cottages built as modules

Secondary School at Djilakh

Materials
Bamboo bundles, woven local textiles, native timber, discarded tyres, reclaimed plastic
Colour and light
Natural bamboo and textile, with native orchards around the playground
Method
Catenary arches; roof in layers, each treated differently against water, termites and weather (lake-salt soak, pressure treatment, used motor oil); staggered classrooms for air movement without machines

Aesthetics

Materials
Reclaimed wood blocks, acoustic panels, optical fibre, glass-topped table
Colour and light
Wood stained from honey to deep red, a pale blue door traced in red conduit, a dark blue ceiling of constellations, violet evening light
Method
Blocks set at different depths on small modular panels, so the wall, furniture and lamps can all be carried to a new address

Direct Dialogue Initiatives

Materials
Terracotta, timber, upcycled blue denim, plants
Colour and light
Cool denim blue, warm wood, earthy terracotta
Method
Terracotta made with specially trained artisans; seven small spaces, each for a different posture and mood

Mather Square

Materials
Timber lattice, glass, solar panels, rooftop planting
Colour and light
Warm timber against glass, with green on the roof
Method
A façade of traditional patterns that opens and closes by solar power; food courts shared by operators across the day; a rooftop rented to urban farms

Bella Vida

Materials
Plaster, hand-made lamps, restored timber doors, timber shelves
Colour and light
Sage green running into deep maroon, a wave of deep blue, sky-blue shelves, doors washed in blue with the grain showing
Method
Walls rolled, sponged and sanded by hand; a torn-paper edge gave the blue its shape; each colour tested on timber strips first

Thesis: choosing a topic

Architectural psychology is full of open questions. Each of the twelve research areas of Project E states its aims, and any of them can start a thesis. Start with the one that makes you curious, then read its focus, aims and keywords.

  1. Discovering Spatial Judgement Through a Child's Perspective
    Aim: To understand how a child learns to perceive through the various environmental factors that might influence and intervene in the learning processes.
  2. The Psychology Behind Traditional Geomancy
    Aim: To study the possible reasons for the enlisted directives.
  3. Psychological Inferences in Heritage Architecture and its Impact on Human Evolution
    Aim: To draw correlations between the development in architecture and the psychological development of the brain through a deeper understanding of social, cultural and economic patterns.
  4. Comprehending Interior Spaces Through the Lens of Human Emotions
    Aim: To study the interior spatial contexts and contents across the axes of time and geography.
  5. The Influence of the Built Environment on Mental Wellbeing
    Aim: To classify and organise the studies and resulting theories on the relationship between mental health and settlement design and planning.
  6. Human Response to Experimental Architecture
    Aim: To propose a method of evaluating experimental architecture.
  7. Role of Architectural Juxtapositioning in Emotional Valence and Arousal
    Aim: To study the individual elements in a space and the cognitive processes required to perceive these units in seclusion.
  8. Human Information Processing of Technological Revolution Within Architecture
    Aim: To visualize the possibilities of design in the future.
  9. Therapeutic Milieu
    Aim: To understand the reformative properties of architecture.
  10. Association of Phantasmagorical Spaces and Human Emotions
    Aim: To analyse the stimulus created in the neural systems of the brain.
  11. Engaging Cognitive Processes Using Materials
    Aim: To study all the kinds of materials that have been used in architectural spaces.
  12. Role of Architecture in Individual and Social Disparity
    Aim: To study the role of architectural and interior design in social, cultural and political severance among the different communities that co-exist in a region.

Hear how other students found their topics, and how a thesis can go wrong, in the Thesis playlist. Open the Thesis playlist.

Studying architecture in India

These are the questions young architects ask. The conversations in Design Dialogues take them up, and a good place to start is The Gateway to Architecture, An Architectural Orientation and Financial Stability.

The podcast: every playlist

Starting out: is architecture for me?

Thesis, studio and the curriculum

Sustainability, materials and traditional building

Careers and the profession

The seven long conversations are on the Design Dialogues page.

Read

Walk through the maze →