THE DESIGN WORKSHOP AS AN EXAMPLE OF THE LINK BETWEEN EDUCATION AND RESEARCH IN ARCHITECTURE

Introduction:
The design workshop is an intensive form of architectural education. Its point is to solve a design task over the course of few days which is done by groups of students and under the supervision of tutors. The main purposes of the workshop are: focus on one design task, intensive team work, the specific atmosphere of cooperation and competition, and also fast results and their immediate confrontation. It is possible to use architectural design workshop in the research process, especially in case of development potential of a specific area.

Objective:
The objective of the article is to present the ties between architectural research and education using as an example the student workshop conducted by the author of the article in 2011. The conditions of including a workshop in the research process will be particularly examined.

The workshop:
The participants of the workshop were 26 architecture students and 5 tutors from Poland and the Czech Republic. The workshop concerned the central area of the city of Katowice, which included the Zietek Roundabout, Market Square and the Korfanty Avenue connecting both. The workshops were preceded by researching the influence the new development of an area may have on the already existing buildings and recognising current trends and ideas on shaping central parts of cities. Hypothetical graphs of shading and obscuring the already existing housing were prepared. The following five ideas were chosen, in concordance with the number of workshop groups:

a – preservation of modernist architecture,
b – Ecological Compact City,
c – New Urbanism,
d – Compact City,
e – metropolisation of the city.

The task of each team was to produce a development plan for the Roundabout – Market Square area, by applying one of the ideas. It was required to take into account the influence of the proposed new development on the living conditions in the already existing housing, especially as far as lighting and sunlight reaching the flats were concerned. As a result 5 area development variants were obtained. Among them were ten worth noting particular solutions, which so far had not been taken into account while examining the area development predisposition. As a result of further research four of these proposals have been used in different ways in further studies, analyses and planning and design work over the development of the Katowice Roundabout – Market Square area.

Conclusion:
The Katowice example proves that the design workshop, which is an important part of architectural education, may also be a significant element of the research process in architecture, provided that:

1. The design tasks are defined on the basis of the results of previous research.
2. The tasks are varied but complementary.
3. The work of each particular team is directed in a way allowing for their further comparative analysis.
4. The results of the workshops are examined as to the innovative character of the proposed solutions.
5. The most original ideas are verified from the point of view of their usefulness for further research.