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Urban Workshop

A sketch of an architectural floorplan, featuring detailed lines and measurements that outline the layout of rooms, walls, and spaces. The design is clean and precise, capturing the overall structure of the building.

The Urban Workshop, formed in 2003 by Architecture and Environmental Design faculty at Tyler, is an interdisciplinary social impact design collaborative that engages underserved communities and mission-driven organizations in creating environments that are beautiful, just and sustainable.

Where theory connects with lived experience

As a university-based community design center, the award-winning program brings students together with community partners to collaborate in addressing real-world issues and problems. Our process is human-centered, critically thoughtful, and action-oriented, building on Tyler’s disciplinary expertise and the aspirations and imagination of community partners. 

Community-Based Learning + Practice

Students discover a framework for community-based learning and a model of ethically driven professional practice.

Community partners benefit from an interconnected and holistically conceived solutions. Together, we research and plan neighborhood space, design buildings and landscapes, and make public art.

Download Selected Projects PDF

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  • We offer a collaborative academy-community practice in urban design, research, architecture, and art-making projects for underserved neighborhoods and organizations.
  • We create curricular opportunities for students to deepen their creative education through unique interdisciplinary and community-based experience.
  • We advance knowledge in healthy and sustainable urban place-making.
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Associated Tyler Faculty

  • Sally Harrison smiles at the camera, standing in front of a vibrant mural filled with flowers.

    Sally Harrison, AIA

    Professor

  • Jeffery Doshna leans on a railing inside the Tyler building, hands together, smiling at the camera.

    Jeffrey Doshna, PhD, AICP

    Associate Professor of Instruction and Program Head of Planning & Community Development

  • Fauzia Sadiq Garcia smiling inside an architecture studio at Tyler, surrounded by build models and design materials.

    Fauzia Sadiq Garcia, RA, LEED AP, IFMA

    Curriculum Coordinator of Facilities Management and Architecture Majors + Associate Professor

  • Pablo Meninato, with his arms crossed looks at the camera in an architecture studio space.

    Pablo Meninato

    Associate Professor

  • Jeff Richards looking and smiling at the camera.

    Jeff Richards, RA

    Assistant Professor of Instruction

Academic and Professional Collaborators 

  • Rowan University
  • Jefferson University
  • University of Pennsylvania
  • University-Community Collaborative of Philadelphia
  • JacobsWyper Architects
  • WellsAppelSikora Landscape Architects

Funding

Urban Workshop is supported by both external project grants and grants from the Temple University Office of Research.

External funding has been provided by the National Endowment for the Arts, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Pew Center for Arts & Heritage, Wachovia Regional Foundation, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, U.S. Department of Education, John and Kira’s Chocolates, The Village of Arts and Humanities, and the Norris Square Civic Association.

Contact

 

Sally Harrison - sally.harrison@temple.edu or 215.850.4433

Director and Professor of Architecture