The College of Design Rome Program offers an optional course of study for qualified students. The college's flagship international program has given more than 1000 students the opportunity to study in Rome since its inception in 1991. It is the only fully licensed study-abroad program in the Iowa Regents' system.
Every other summer (2009) Landscape Architecture students are given the opportunity to utilize this facility with Iowa State University faculty members and European lecturers teaching students in English.
Students attend classes at our studio facilities in the historic center of Rome, Palazzo Cenci-Bolognetti, a sixteenth-century edifice located in the Piazza delle Cinque Scole near the Tiber River. Past Landscape Architecture classes offered during this program include:
- The Urban Design Studio - with focus on the Tiber River. The river, which was Rome's primary geographic, topographic and economic reason for being, has over the years been cut off from the city due to recurring floods and their remedy, the late 19th century river embankments. The studio examined several key sites/stretches along the river and developed proposals/models to restore access and reintegrate the river into the daily life of the city. Continuous parallel and cross access paths and facilities were proposed to be integrated into the high embankment walls and to serve adjacent neighborhoods, the general public, and tourists. The studio engaged a variety of issues related to the Tiber River system/fabric and related city-wide public space, transportation/infrastructure, and urban monuments. The project was set within the context of the 2000 City of Rome New Urban Development Plan. The urban morphology class complemented and supplemented the studio project providing relevant historical and theoretical background.
- The urban morphology of Rome focused on the evolving structure and form of Rome through two main linear infrastructural components; natural and built waterways (i.e., river and aqueducts) and roads. A series of walks combined with class lectures followed the main water courses and the main roads entering and traversing the city. The study of Waters in Rome centered on their historical and contemporary commercial, social, and physical (city form/space) significance. The study of Roman Roads highlighted their military, social, economic, and cermonial aspects.
- Field Trip - A 3-day field trip to visit and sketch several prominent villas in Lazio and Toscana with a completed assignment and presentation to the class at the end of the semester.
Updated 05/07/09-09:13 PID:1623
