College of Design

The Holistic Options for Planet Earth Sustainability (HOPES) conference, an annual gathering hosted each spring term by the University of Oregon’s School of Architecture and Allied Arts, is one of the only student-run sustainability conferences in the United States.

The event features lectures, panel discussions, workshops, exhibitions, and nightly mixers. It is free and open to the UO community as well as the general public.

Housing design needs in Oregon and Portugal share surprising similarities. Both enjoy Mediterranean climates. Both face similar zoning and land use policy challenges. And both strive to provide affordable housing in challenging economic times.

UO researchers recently completed a major national study on ways to best manage campus emergencies, the findings from which were spotlighted on The National Center for Campus Public Safety (NCCPS) website.

“The Umpqua Community College tragedy underscores the importance of campus emergency management programs,” said Robert Parker, director of the Community Service Center (CSC), the program in the UO’s Department of Planning, Public Policy and Management that completed the study.

The last time you flushed a toilet, you likely didn’t think twice about it, much less about possible ramifications. But a University of Oregon architecture studio is focused on virtually eliminating water waste within urban buildings to help mitigate the effects of climate change.

Tucked away in the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, in a small alcove embraced by four oil paintings, are two glass cases displaying five objects from the 14th through 16th centuries. Some museum-goers walk right past the cases, not realizing they’ve just bypassed the chance to see original works of art on loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

The National Endowment for the Arts has awarded an Art Works grant of $20,000 to the UO’s Department of Product Design for “Unparalleled Oregon Product Design,” a week-long series of free educational workshops, lectures, and exhibitions in uniquely Oregonian design.

Some 40,000 people from 60 countries will see designs by two UO faculty members exhibiting at the Stockholm Furniture & Light Fair in February. Because 80 percent of exhibitors at the fair come from Scandinavia, the invitation to the Americans is a coup.

Putting a brand on a sports product or an athlete is big business and requires careful consideration, Associate Professor Susan Sokolowski noted recently in an article on the Adobe Creative Cloud website. “The branding should be strong and recognizable to play up the benefit of being associated with a sports star, but people also should be able to understand the relationship between the parent company and athlete sub-brand,” she said. “Look at athletes who’ve had successful partnerships.

Erkki Huhtamo is an inquisitive man.

Professionally, he collects optical devices “such as magic lanterns, peep show boxes, phenakistiscopes, praxinoscopes, kinoras and other fascinating things,” he says. “I use them in my research and teaching and also to illustrate my books.”

Personally, he is absorbed by coffee. He roasts, grinds and even grows what he drinks (“something I could not even dream about doing in Finland,” the Finland native says).

A&AA Dean Christoph Lindner undertook a lecture tour in England and Ireland in January, exploring topics including urban renewal on Amsterdam’s waterfront, the “aesthetics of slowness” in global cities, New York’s High Line elevated park, and the urban politics of Brutalism.