DS220 IAD I
This course serves as the students’ introduction into the design of built form. Content for the course includes a discussion into the nature of human experience and perception of built form and the basis for the design of built form, an examination of the process of design and an introduction into the “vocabulary” of form. Students are called upon to design a series of small-scale projects.
The Design Studio established the central thread throughout the curriculum of the Interior Architecture + Design area. As such, the Design Studio provides an opportunity for effectively integrating knowledge gained from the full breadth of student experience, in or out of the classroom. Each student will take a design studio every semester that he/she is in school, beginning with the first semester sophomore year and culminating with the senior thesis, which takes the student through the last two semesters of his/her senior year. From an educational standpoint, the design studio is the place where the student gains insight into the “act of design” by a process that challenges the student’s ability to generate ideas of built form, render these ideas through the particular medium of built form, and critically assess the validity for the forms and the ideas they exhibit:
design: to form a plan scheme; to conceive and arrange in the mind; to originate mentally; plan out, contrive (the Oxford English Dictionary)
Design is identified as both a result (product; noun) and a process (act; verb) directed towards the discovery, invention, or realization of that result. Design as a process is concerned with “making.” The design of interior space is directed towards the making of place for human habitation. A distinguishing feature of interior design is that the design process is generally carried forward through a variety of surrogate forms (models, sketches, drawings, etc.), which serve as stand-ins or representations for the actual built form. Within the context of such an understanding the design of built form may be described as “the mental making of a scheme for the physical making of place.”
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS221 IAD II
The focus of this course is on the design of the home. Students are presented with a broad survey of house design through a cultural/historical perspective that incorporates the study of numerous contemporary examples.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: DS220

DS222 IAD Computer Drawing I
This course will introduce the students to the role of the computer in the Interior Architecture + Design field and in today’s professional office. The students’ introduction to computer drawing is intended to parallel their instruction in the traditional forms of visual communication, i.e., drawing and sketching. Students will be instructed in the software programs that are currently dominant in the profession.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS223 IAD Computer Drawing II
This course is a follow-up to the Interior Architecture + Design Computer Drawing I course. Students will further develop their understanding and ability relative to the programs introduced in the earlier course and at the same time gain familiarity with additional programs.
The Computer Drawing II course will explore the use of the computer as a tool in producing a set of contract documents. Students will be asked to produce a built drawing of an existing building, and to assemble a set of contract documents of a design.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: DS222

DS224 Architectural Drawing
This course serves as a comprehensive introduction into the full, broad range of drawing types that have been traditionally employed by designers of the built environment. The teaching of traditional drawing skills is intended to complement the students’ computer drawing instruction. Students will learn to execute a range of drawing types and to explore a variety of different media.
Everyone can learn to draw well, and hence to communicate effectively. The most important tool is less the hand which holds the pencil than the mind’s eye which finds the structure of the visual image, which monitors the hand as it executes the line, and which reflects upon the line just executed, assessing it on the basis of its visual appearance, and in terms of its particular effectiveness in achieving the aim for which it was intended. Students will be working to train hand, eye, and mind to work together conscientiously. By the students paying close attention to the “crafting” of each exercise that he/she executes, by attending to the continual gains that he/she makes, by adopting an attitude which is both critical and supportive towards his/her own work as well as the work of others, the student will acquire the necessary confidence in his/her abilities that is essential to achieving success in this program.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS225 IAD Systems I
The Systems I course presents students with an understanding of the building as a series of fully integrated, interlocking systems. This broad overview is directed ;it the student gaining a fundamental awareness of these systems from which to then build a more thorough working understanding.
The Interior Architecture + Design Area offers two, non sequential courses in Architectural Systems. Each course is offered every other spring semester and combines sophomore and junior level students. Students entering into the program. In an even year will begin with one course, while students entering into the program in an odd year will begin with the other course. One course will be concerned with the fundamentals of building construction: Including building materials, the building structure, building terms, and basic construction methods. The other course will cover issues related to interior finish materials and their application.
Even more than for other course offerings in the IA+D Area, this course depends upon hands on. learning by demanding concrete in the form of hands on building. Students will be required to design, detail, and install actual built constructions. As with the other studio courses in the IA+D Area, the goal of this course is to achieve design results of the highest quality. Where this course will differ from other courses however, is in the particular focus and scope of the design decisions required of the student. The focus here will be on the construction details and the impact of construction on design.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS230 Computer Studio I
This course is an introduction to the use of the computer and essential software as tools for the visual communicator. In Computer Studio I, students become acquainted with the Macintosh computing platform by engaging in an intensive and thorough exploration of the software/hardware commonly used by designers and artists. Through demonstrations and experimentation, students will learn the fundamentals of Adobe Illustrator, InDesign and Photoshop (as well as other design/utility applications) and their roll in print media and digital pre-press.
This one semester, three credit course is designed to introduce sophomore level communication design students to the Macintosh computing environment as a tool, and perhaps as a medium, for concepting and composing visual communications. An introduction to basic computer functionality will take place, followed by directed projects which will introduce students to working with Quark Xpress and Adobe Illustrator software to produce communication design solutions that may be successfully taken to press. The incorporation of the graphics applications platform as a foundative element in the process of design will be explored. This course has not been conceived and will not be taught merely as a means by which students will learn these two software applications. Rather, the course structure will stress me use of this software as a means to engaging in the design process, as a method for creating graphic communications that may be output as press ready film, laser comps, or output directly to a digital press.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS320 IAD III
This course serves as an introduction to design within the scope of the commercial/retail industry. Students study and learn from published material and visit local examples of the particular type of space that they will be called on to design.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS321 IAD IV
The Architectural Resource Lab is designed to give students the opportunity to attend to the comprehensive nature of a real life design scenario within the scope of small scale projects within a controlled setting. The projects involve the redesign or further design of existing spaces through the study, exploration, design and actual implementation of the design process. The course gives students first hand exposure to the potential for space to become transformed through design. $ Expanded Course Description $ The Architectural Resource Lab is intended to present the student with a realistic set of circumstances organized around the design of a real project. Students in this course will be expected to follow a project through from beginnning to end, from concept through the contract document phase.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS324 Interior Computer Drawing III
This course serves as an additional follow up to the Interior Architecture + Design Computer Drawing I course. Students are once again called upon to further develop their understanding and ability relative to the programs introduced in the earlier course and, at the same time, to gain familiarity with additional software programs.
The Computer Drawing Ill course will explore the use of the computer as a tool in producing a set of contract documents. Students will be asked to produce a built drawing of an existing building, and to assemble a set of contract documents of a design.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: DS222

DS325 IAD Systems II: Lighting
The IA+D Systems II course is set up around the design of a small scale project that students take from initial conception (sketching and modeling) through actual construction. Prior to construction, students document their designs through the production of a set of construction drawings.
Architectural Woodwork focuses on the concepts and skills required to design and fabricate a comprehensive architectural interior consisting of millwork, joinery, paneling, casework and furniture. Following dual tracks of design and execution, students will begin with individual exercises in wood joinery followed by a team experience in all phases of the design and execution of an architectural studio environment for eight students. Experiences in initial programming phase through conceptual design, schematic design, design development, design detailing, contract documents, shop drawings, fabrication and installation, are designed to serve as an appropriate model for projects that students may encounter once they have embarked upon their professional careers.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS420 Interior Architecture & Design Thesis
The Interior Architecture + Design Thesis demands a comprehensive effort of a self directed course of study. This course permits each student to choose a project specific to their area of interest. The selected project is intended to serve as the culmination of the graduating senior's three year Interior Architecture + Design studio experience.
The Interior Architecture and Design program requires graduating seniors to execute a comprehensive design undertaken as a thesis. A thesis project is not simply a large project, or one that merely takes a long time to execute, or one that is comprehensive in nature. Rather, a thesis project purports to advance a particular idea, an attitude about design, a method or way of designing, an untested response to an old problem, or a novel response to new conditions. The development of your thesis ought not to be limited to the development of your design but to the development of the ideas that underlie that design.
This course is intended to serve as a culminating senior experience, a capstone to your educational career at MIAD. The ultimate tangible goal of this effort is the display of your work in the MIAD Senior Thesis Exhibition next spring. The course is intended to provide you with the opportunity to put forth a body of work that will make the pronouncement at the time of this exhibition, "this is what I am capable of In an effort to get you to the Senior Thesis Exhibition, this course will take you through the design development phase of your project, which is to say, that every last detail of the design of your project will have been attended to and accounted for.
Credits: 6.0
Prerequisites: DS420

DS421 Thesis Presentation
The Interior Architecture + Design Thesis Presentation provides the student with an opportunity to develop, in final model and drawing form as well as full-scale mockups, the design of the public exhibition and presentation of his/her thesis project.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: DS420

DS423 Portfolio Preparation
This course gives each student the opportunity to assemble his/her best work from school and professional practice into a compact, presentable format for review by prospective employers or graduate school admission committees.
The Interior Architecture + Design program requires graduating seniors to compile a comprehensive portfolio to serve as a record of their experience from the time that they enter into the IA+D Area, including appropriate documentation of their coursework at MIAD as well as work done in internship and other professionally related experiences. This document will serve as a record of the student's experiences, as evidence of understanding gained and ability displayed, and as such, as the most important tool in that student's effort to attract the best possible position in a design office or entry into a graduate school of their choosing upon graduation from MIAD.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS425 Business Principles & Practices of IAD
This course is intended to offer students a broad overview of the business principles and practices that characterize the Interior Architecture + Design profession. Students are instructed in the various forms of design practice, how to establish one's own design practice, and the various stages of a job.
This class is built on the premise of a general understanding of business principles and practices related to the field of interior architecture and design. Guest speakers will be involved to give actual examples of business experiences. The goal will be for the student to achieve an awareness of business practices, construction knowledge and general rules of architectural principles.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None

DS484 Internship
The internship is an off-campus learning experience which provides students an opportunity to apply knowledge, theories, skills, and techniques learned in the classroom to the working environment.
Credits: 3.0
Prerequisites: None