Architecture

Overview

Architecture is a field at the intersection of technology and art with strong social, cultural, environmental, and economic implications. The Major in Architecture aims at

• deepening the students’ technical, scientific and artistic thinking as foundation for building a socially responsible and sustainable future.
• fostering creative exploration and experimentation as well as multi-disciplinary collaboration.

After completing the degree, the students will have:

• the ability to apply various design strategies in reaction to programmatic, technical, and aesthetic requirements.
• an understanding of the main lines of development in history and theory of architecture and their contextual relevance for critical design thinking.
• the ability of identifying systemic interactions and the transformation of these interactions into design operations for socially responsible and sustainable action.

The Architecture programme from Aalto University offers an opportunity for individual development of skills and knowledge in a range of specialization fields such as wood construction, building design and the reuse of buildings, human-centered design and wellbeing, computational design, preservation or urban design and planning.

Career opportunities

The majority of architects work as project architects in a company or as entrepreneurs in their own architectural agency, working with new or renovation projects. The public sector is another important employer, with job titles including zoning architect, permit architect, cultural environment manager, museum director and municipal architect. Architects work as academic researchers or teachers, such as professors or lecturers. Architects can also be construction managers, project designers or experts in the property field; senior inspectors or specialists in the environmental field or exhibition architects and curators in the field of art. The duties of an architect are steadily expanding from traditional design tasks to other fields that require comprehensive vision and creative problem-solving ability.