Woodbury School of Architecture Professor Ewan Branda has been named Graduate Chair of the School of Architecture in Los Angeles. As Assistant Undergraduate Chair, Ewan returns from sabbatical after leading multiple recruiting efforts to strengthen Woodbury’s undergraduate architecture program.
As Graduate Chair, Ewan will continue to enhance and grow Woodbury School of Architecture’s graduate programs. He will coordinate grad program outreach while fostering interdepartmental collaboration to enhance the reputation of Woodbury’s graduate architecture degrees.
“Having the good fortune of working closely with Ewan over several years, I look forward to having him focus on our graduate programs in Los Angeles. In every role in which he serves – professor, student advisor, administrator, scholar, colleague – he brings an astonishing and consistent level of rigor, a passion for honing skill-sets and concepts in order to achieve clarity and precision, an ability to think critically about aesthetic and technical decisions, and tenacity to strive for excellence in every project. He is a tremendously gifted instructor with an uncanny ability to simplify complex concepts. As thoughtful as he is rational, he is our Mr. Spock. As undergraduate coordinator, he played an instrumental role in guiding and refining the curriculum, supporting faculty and other administrators, and in providing students with tools to achieve professional success. I know he will bring these same qualities to his new position.”
Dr. Branda is an architectural historian and software designer. He has taught thesis studios, foundations studios, and seminars examining contemporary practices of digital humanities and scholarly communications using techniques borrowed from digital gaming and electronic literature. His research interests include architecture’s place in the information society, software as a mode of architectural thinking, late-postwar corporate architecture, and technocracy as creativity. Formerly a registered architect in the province of Québec, he has served as a board member for the LA Forum for Architecture and Urban Design and the Electronic Literature Organization, and is currently a member of the editorial board of the Electronic Book Review.