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HADVC 216 Final Take Home Exam (due to eClass on April 14 by 5 pm MST, 30%)
There are three parts to this exam: 1) a “reflection” essay on sustainable design; 2) a
comparison-contrast analysis; 3) an essay in which you define sustainable design in your
own words and with your own voice.
A study list of designs drawn from course material will be provided at the same time these
instructions are made available to you on Thursday, April 7 in eClass.
Final Take Home Exam Essays:
1. Part 1: Reflections on Sustainable Design
Write a short analysis (400-450 words, no less and no more) about one sustainable
design.
a). Select one design from the PDF of images provided to you.
b). Choose a quote from one of the texts below on sustainable design. Put the
quote at the beginning of your essay. Be sure to cite the text from the list (this
quote as well as the footnote do not count towards word count).
c). Write a short essay explaining how the design embodies your chosen
definition or concept of sustainable design. Rely on visual analysis of the
design and analysis of the way the design works.
No research is needed. Rely instead on visual analysis and the knowledge base
you have developed over the course of the term. If you do bring in any form of
research, please cite this (in footnote form) (this footnote does not count
towards word count). But a word of caution: this is not a research essay. It is an
analytical project. There is no need for additional research and it most likely will
weaken your analysis.
For those of you who have never used footnotes or endnotes in Word, go to the
INSERT menu at the top, scroll down to FOOTNOTE, and then select it. The
footnote will be automatically generated. For the correct footnote formatting,
click on this footnote1 or see the titles listed below as examples of
footnote formatting.
Assigned readings from which you can draw references about sustainability in
your essay:
Ezio Manzini, “Introduction,” in Design, When Everybody Designs: An
Introduction to Design for Social Innovation, tr. Rachel Coad (Cambridge: The
MIT Press, 2015), 1-3.
Robert Holden, “Introduction,” Landscape Architecture: An Introduction
([England]: Laurence King Publishing, 2014), 13-16.
Francis D.K. Ching, “First Principles,” Green Building Illustrated (New York:
Wiley, 2014), 13-24.
Linna Hu and Hua Dong, “How Consumers Read the Visual Presentation of Food
Packaging in a Cross-Cultural Context: A conceptual framework and case study,”
in Design as a catalyst for change – DRS International Conference 2018, 25-28
June, Limerick, Ireland, eds. Storni, C., Leahy, K., McMahon, M., Lloyd, P. and
Bohemia, E. (2018): 656-666.
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Denis Antoine, “Current Issues in the Fashion Industry,” Fashion
Design (London: Laurence King Publishing, 2020), 26-29.
Adam Minter, “How Beijing–and the Rest of China–Recycles Plastic [Excerpt],”
Scientific American (November 8, 2013). doi:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/china-recycles-plastic/ Accessed
INSERT DATE YOU ACCESSED THIS ARTICLE.
2. Part 2: Comparison-contrast analysis (one essay of 400-450 words)
Song Dong’s installation Waste Not displays and makes visible to us the things that
the artist’s mother lived with throughout her lifetime. In the video documenting the
installation at the Barbican Center that we screened in class during Week 9, curator
Sunny Cheung describes the form of the installation as a traditional Chinese garden.
Analyze Waste Not in comparison with one of the garden designs explored in Week 2:
Liuyuan “Garden for Lingering” Suzhou. Ming dynasty, 1593.
Atelier VISION, Dongyuan Neighbourhood Committee Revision, Shanghai, 2019
July Cooperative Company, Adjoin Garden, Shenzhen, 2020
Change Studio, Wanguofu, 2016-17
How does the comparison of Waste Not and garden design relate to the ideas explored
by Slavoj Zizek on garbage and landfills that we learned about in Week 9?
NB: For images of Waste Not, see below or look at the Week 9 Study Images link to
the project. Slavoj Zizek’s video on waste was screened in lecture during Week 9. For
thinking about garden design, see your notes from Week 2, as well as the Study
Images from Week 2.
Cheung: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bG4SeIVqhkY
Zizek: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g-lthe47-NU
Song Dong. B. 1966.
Waste Not video
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3. Part 3: Sustainable design essay (2 bulleted lists and one essay of 400-450 words for
part c)
This essay asks you to analyze Bjarke Engels’ AI City in Chongqing in order to
determine whether or not it is a sustainable design (see images below). Little
information is published on this design outside of the images of it, so you will have to
depend on visual analysis and notes from Lisa’s final lecture to determine if the design
is sustainable.
a). Make a bulleted list of the reasons the design is a sustainable design.
b). Make a bulleted list of the reasons the design is not a sustainable design.
c). Write an essay highlighting what you believe to be the four most important
reasons the design is sustainable or is not sustainable. Argue for one or the
other, in other words.
NB: do not attempt to resubmit Assignment 1 or 2 as a response to any of the exam
questions, and do not write about the same designs that were the focus of those
assignments. If you do so, your marks will automatically be assessed as a 0 (zero).
This take-home exam is due to eClass on April 14, 2021, at 5 pm MDT and must be
submitted to eClass as ONE WORD DOCUMENT in times new roman, 12 point font, double
spaced, paginated, with your name and student number on the first page. Please save the
file in .docx format; no pdf, no page or other formats. Points will be deducted for failure to
follow formatting instructions.
When you upload your Word document to eClass, save as:
“LAST NAME_FIRST NAME_STUDENT ID_EXAM”
Eg: “Hadid_Zaha_1234567_Exam” Again: please save the file in .docx format; no pdf, no
page or other formats. Points will be deducted for failure to follow formatting instructions.
The University of Alberta is located in ᐊᒥᐢᑿᒌᐚᐢᑲᐦᐃᑲᐣ (Amiskwacîwâskahikan) on Treaty Six
territory.
1 A footnote citation in the Chicago style (used in HADVC in general) typically is formatted
as: Author’s name, Title (Place of publication: Publisher, date), page. The title of an article
or chapter is put into “quotation marks.” The title of a book is in italics.
Bjarke Engels
• Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) AI City in Chongqing
In AI CITY, Cloud Valley is envisioned as a city where
people, technology, and nature thrive together –
with spaces designed for all types of life: human life,
plant life, animal life, and even artificial life. — Bjarke
Ingels, Founder & Creative Director of BIG-Bjarke
Ingels Group.
