Mission of SCE
Encompassing a unique confluence of design disciplines, the School of Constructed Environments nurtures and guides tomorrow’s leaders in socially and environmentally sustainable, technologically innovative buildings, interiors, lighting, and products. In a time of unprecedented change, we foster the skills, values, and vision vital to creative thinking and the realization of a more integrated, equitable and delightful world.
Student and Alumni News
MFA Lighting Design Graduate, Lydia Simpson ’23, Wins IESNYC Thesis Award
Congratulations to 2023 Thesis Award Recipient, Lydia Simpson ’23! Lydia Simpson is a recent graduate of the Parsons School of Design MFA Lighting Design program. She received a BFA in Design and Technology for Theater from the University of North Georgia and worked as a Lighting Designer in Atlanta …
Announcing the 2023 Collab Student Design Competition
Announcing the annual Collab Student Design Competition, inspired by Stephen Burks Dear Colleagues, What does the next generation imagine for the future of design? Every year, university-level design students respond to a unique challenge that affects daily life with the best designs, which are showcased by Collab and the Philadelphia Museum of …
Faculty News
EXD Architecture Featured on WORLD’S GREATEST at Bloomberg TV
EXD ARCHITECTURE, directed by SCE faculty member Victoria Benatar, was recently featured on Bloomberg TV’s World’s Greatest. WHO IS EXD? Based in the ever-changing city of New York, Victoria Benatar and Michelle Cianfaglione founded EXD ARCHITECTURE to use design to analyze dualities in the city, which they translate into ‘layered’ …
Hana Kassem Elevated to the 2024 AIA College of Fellows
SCE faculty member and KPF Principal, Hana Kassem, was one of the 10 architects elevated from AIA’s New York City chapter to Fellowship, and one of only two in the Design category. The 2024 Jury of Fellows for the American Institute of Architects (AIA) elevated 96 new members to its …
School News
Brian McGrath: Conversation between Design and Environmental Sciences: Waterscape Urbanism and the City as an Ecosystem
Brian McGrath and Danai Thaitakoo’s collaborative and respective works have opened up a new approach to seeing and designing a city as part of wider ecological processes mediated by water flow. The architects’ engagement with environmental sciences — landscape ecology and hydrology in particular — has contributed to the emerging …
MFA Lighting Design Graduate, Lydia Simpson ’23, Wins IESNYC Thesis Award
Congratulations to 2023 Thesis Award Recipient, Lydia Simpson ’23! Lydia Simpson is a recent graduate of the Parsons School of Design MFA Lighting Design program. She received a BFA in Design and Technology for Theater from the University of North Georgia and worked as a Lighting Designer in Atlanta …
Special Projects
Disaster Preparedness and Creative Design
Parsons School of Constructed Environments (SCE) collaborates with a leading expert on disaster preparedness education, Mr. Hirokazu Nagata, to conduct workshops and design intensive that will culminate in the first North America iteration of the collaboration exhibition, Earth Manual Project, which will be held at the Sheila C. Johnson Design Center in Fall 2018. Earth Manual Project is an accumulation of knowledge and ideas gleaned from the experience of living through disasters. It will showcase thoughtful works by designers, artists, and architects from Japan, Southeast Asia, and U.S.
The project started in Spring 2017 with This Could Save Your Life: Creative Design & Disaster Preparedness lecture, where Mr. Nagata introduced his body of work which included preparing children through games and survival camps, and creating easy-to-use pocket survival manuals, multi-functional emergency shelters, and other imaginatively designed products.
In Fall 2017, students in Parsons SCE engaged in a week-long intensive as they developed design solutions in architecture, interior design, lighting design, and product design for surviving natural disasters. Students examined precedent case studies on natural and man-made disasters provided by the Zolberg Institute on Migration and Mobility at the New School.
This page provides disaster preparedness resources and highlights students’ works during the intensive.
Publications
SCE Student Council Launches Podcast “Table Talks”
SCE Student Council has launched a new podcast series called Table Talks. The podcast hosts discussions with faculty, industry professionals, and students of different disciplines. Table Talks was created and inspired by the ethos of conversations that naturally accrue in studio spaces of collaboration. We wanted to create a space to capture those discussions …
Parsons Interior Design Alum Featured in two articles in New York Times
Parsons SCE Alumna Sheila Bridges has been featured in two articles in New York Times for her work. The Wallpaper That Is Also a ‘Reminder That My Ancestors Had My Back’ Hay House: How Designer Sheila Bridges Made Space for Herself