Abstract:

Design related fields are quite intricate and it is hard to define strict boundaries in between these disciplines which cause the necessity of collaboration. Especially during professional careers, designers work in multidisciplinary environments where they need to develop responses collaboratively. However, undergraduate design education is being criticized for missing to fulfill this need. The aim of this paper is to discuss the role and benefits of multidisciplinary design education with the example of the course named “An Introduction to Contemporary Architectural Landscaping”. As the methodology of the paper, through deconstruction of the 3 parted course structure and analysis of student works, this paper analyses the role of a multidisciplinary education on students’ learning experiences. First two parts of the course focus on technical aspects of landscape architecture discipline, and cultural, physiological and psychological effects of landscape projects for users. Last part of the course focus on creating a platform for students to work in collaboration with other students to gain practical experience in design field where they develop a landscape architecture project on sites from their near environments. There are three main findings of the study. Firstly, inclusion of students from different disciplines in the same course increases the success rate via cross-learning experiences. Secondly, during design education, having the chance of participation to courses from different disciplines help to broaden students’ perspectives on problem solving during design phase. Finally, projects in environments that students experience in their everyday life increase their success rates. Results of the study that is based on the outcomes of the course that is conducted with the students of two different design departments indicate that this course structure and projects that are designed can be a guide for other design courses to develop a multidisciplinary course structure to include students from different disciplines, enrich their learning experiences and success after graduation.

Keywords: