In the School of Architecture, students pursuing the Master of Architecture degree engage in a yearlong investigation in which they select a topical issue, develop a body of research both within and outside the discipline of architecture, and create a complete and detailed architectural design response to the topic. Master of Architecture thesis projects at Portland State range from community-focused public interest design concepts to explorations of architectural materiality and sustainability, from the poetic to the concrete and everything in between. The thesis program culminates in oral presentations to a panel of invited jurors, followed by the production of a commemorative book detailing the students' research, design process, and inspiring results.
*Thesis Reviews have been pushed back one week and will now take place May 13-16.
Schedule of Reviews: Subject to change
Monday 13th:
12:00 - 01:00 Maribel Zepeda | SH 212
01:00 - 02:00 Athena Rilatos | SH 212
02:30 - 03:30 Regina Batiste | SH 212
03:30 - 04:30 Van Khue Do Thai | SH 235
Tuesday 14th:
09:45 - 10:00 Niusha Manavi Namaghi | SH 137
10:45 - 11:45 Eric Giovannetti | SH 235
01:15 - 02:15 Victoria Fuentes-Sotelo | SH 3rd Floor
02:30 - 03:30 Brandi Barlow | SH 212
03:30 - 04:30 Alondra Maldonado | SH 212
Wednesday 15th:
12:00 - 01:00 Zeta Blice | SH 212
01:00 - 02:00 Rebecca Silk | SH 235
02:30 - 04:00 Ethan Goldblatt & Kaleb Huerta | SH 3rd Floor Crit Corner
Thursday 16th:
12:00 - 01:00 Adam Lee Soon | SH 3rd Floor
01:00 - 02:00 Lauren Espinoza | SH 212
02:30 - 03:30 Brianna Montes | SH 212
03:30 - 04:30 Sam Barber | SH 212
Visiting Guest Reviewers
Sharone Tomer | Virginia Tech
Sharone Tomer teaches design studios and courses on urbanism and social issues at Virginia Tech. Her work sits at the intersection of architectural history and urban studies through research that explores how architectural practices operate within and address conditions of urbanized inequality; her teaching and research focus on housing, public space, and architectural activism. Her research topics include spatial change in late-apartheid Cape Town, contested histories, and transforming spaces in Appalachia.
Jonathan Bolch | Woofter Bolch Architecture
Jonathan Bolch is Principal, RA, LEED AP of Woofter Bolch Architecture. A native of Raleigh, North Carolina, Jonathan has over 20 years of professional experience practicing and teaching architecture in a diverse array of places, including New York, Boston, Seoul, and Portland. As an architect, he has led the design effort on a wide range of project types and scales, including institutional, commercial, and residential, with a particular focus on creating enduring buildings for colleges and universities. His portfolio of educational projects includes work for leading institutions around the country, from Princeton to Portland State, from the University of Virginia to the University of Hawaii. Jonathan received a Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University of Virginia and a Master of Architecture from Yale University. In addition to his work as an architect, Jonathan has taught as Adjunct Faculty at the Portland State University School of Architecture since 2012.
Elisandra Garcia-Gonsalez | El Dorado
Elisandra is a designer, activist, and educator from Ciudad Juárez, México. Elisandra is the Director of Engagement at El Dorado Architects, a national firm with offices in Portland and Kansas City. She leads engagement and design processes for diverse project typologies, from equitable urban frameworks for communities to interior architecture grounded on Trauma-Informed design. Elisandra Garcia served as the Design for Spatial Justice Fellow at the University of Oregon School of Architecture & Environment from 2021 to 2023, where she continues to lead the Urban Violence Lab, an advanced architectural design studio that focuses on social inequities within our shared urban environment.
Yuki Bowman | Waechter Architecture
Yuki is an architect and project lead at Waechter Architecture. She holds a Master of Architecture degree from UC Berkeley and a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard College. She brings a foundation in design writing and Japanese woodcraft to more than a decade of architectural practice focused on conceptual clarity and spatial dynamism. She led award-winning residential projects with Ogrydziak Prillinger Architects in San Francisco before moving to Portland, where she helped spearhead high-profile cultural projects such as the recently opened PRAx building at OSU's campus in Corvallis. On every project, she collaborates closely with consultants, contractors, and client teams to maintain design rigor throughout the detailing and construction of residential, civic, and educational projects. Yuki is also a lecturer, mentor, and educator for architectural students, with experience teaching at UC Berkeley and Portland State University Department of Architecture.
Justin Fowler | University of Oregon
Justin Fowler teaches studios in architectural design and seminars in history and theory in the urban architecture specialization at the University of Oregon. His doctoral work centers on Pragmatism and the tectonic aesthetics of social and psychological relief in U.S. architecture and urbanism from the late 19th Century to the New Deal, and his contemporary research concerns public health and precarity in the built environment, climate action, anthropotechnics, housing, aging populations, narrative practices, games, and exchanges between physical and digital media environments. His writing has appeared in publications such as Volume, Harvard Design Magazine, Thresholds, PIN-UP, Domus, and Topos, and he has given talks at the GSD, the University of Virginia, the Cooper Union, and the Storefront for Art and Architecture, among others. He is an editor of Public Natures: Evolutionary Infrastructures by Weiss/Manfredi (Princeton Architectural Press, 2015) and a founding editor of Manifest: A Journal of American Architecture and Urbanism, the recipient of two grants from the Graham Foundation. He has worked as a designer for Dick van Gameren Architecten in Amsterdam, Somatic Collaborative in Cambridge, and managed research and editorial projects at the Columbia University Lab for Architectural Broadcasting (C-Lab) in New York.