Learning by Doing in Architectural Education: From Urban Design to Architectural Design, Yenikapi-Inebey Case Study

Abstract

This paper reports a 2 semester study conducted with 74

undergraduate students of Architecture at the Istanbul Kultur

University to investigate the extent of architectural design

students' use of urban design information in their projects by

learning by doing method. In the first semester, students

performed a comprehensive analysis of the Yenikapi-Inebey

Quarter of Istanbul in terms of urban design criteria. In the second

semester, students were given the task of creating a massing

study of an architectural design project which was not

constrained in terms of function, hmax or building coefficient,

near the project site. This was followed by an open ended

question to identify the criteria which influenced the designs of

the students. The results of the research reveal that, in terms of

learning by doing method, the students are competent to carry the

knowledge and aspects of urban design to the lower scales of

design.