Design Studio and Fabrication Center

Olin College of Engineering, Needham, MA

Olin College of Engineering is an undergraduate engineering institution focused on innovative approaches to engineering education. Jones was hired to guide the effort to re-think the typical classroom and explore new team-based learning approaches to support their studio classroom model. Through a series of brainstorming sessions with Olin’s representatives, the new classroom was envisioned to provide collaborative studio space, high flexibility, transparency and openness, and to facilitate interdisciplinary exchanges and learning. Second, the existing machine shop in the ground floor of the Academic Center is being rethought as a more integrated studio-shop experience. Rather than learn the principle in studio, then take the shop segment separately, the concept is to fold these two pedagogical endeavors together as a single activity, allowing one to flow into the other on an as-needed basis.