AUTHOR: COLEMAN COKER, SARAH GAMBLE, KATIE SWENSON, AND THOMAS FISHER

Design-build education is a popular segment of architectural education and has a large

audience and a successful publishing track record, including Rural Studio: Samuel Mockbee and an Architecture of Decency published in 2002 and is Princeton Architectural Press’s highest selling publication to date. Around 100 of 123 schools of architecture in the US and Canada have a design / build program of some kind, yet there are only three programs with books documenting their collection of work: Auburn University’s Rural Studio (3 books total), Kansas University’s Studio 804, and Yale Building Project. Environmental Activism by Design will make UT Austin’s Gulf Coast DesignLab the 4th program with a book.

“I am ever grateful for Environmental Activism by Design. Documenting the powerful lessons of the Gulf Coast DesignLab, it offers a passionate and common-sense design approach for ‘building well’ in our unfolding climate calamity, guiding us towards a wholistic ethical and resilient architecture born of its place with hope and deep possibilities.”
—Marlon Blackwell is the recipient of the 2020 AIA Gold Medal and E. Fay Jones Chair in Architecture at the Fay Jones School of Architecture + Design, University of Arkansas.

“Oh, to be a student today introduced to the wonders of coastal wetlands by the Gulf Coast DesignLab; to learn the language of the marsh that locals know; to create with an eye to nature’s own creations; and to envision architecture, a land ethic, and the future as a harmonic whole. A close second to experiencing the real thing is to lose myself in this wise and inspiriting book.”
—Jack E. Davis is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Gulf: The Making of an American Sea and The Bald Eagle: The Improbable Journey of America's Bird. 

“Environmental Activism by Design challenges us to become activists, to make a new civic compact, centered on a just society that is also compassionate and sustainable—in all senses of the word.”
—Reed Kroloff is Dean and the Rowe Family College of Architecture Endowed Chair, Illinois Institute of Technology, as well as author of Barclay & Crousse: Landscapes of Intimacy.

“Environmental Activism by Design presents an extraordinary call to action—to observe attentively, respond ethically, and engage with deep care in our intricate world. These extraordinary projects embrace indeterminacy and change while demonstrating actionable and ethical responses to community placemaking.”
—Catherine Seavitt Nordenson is Professor and Director of the Master of Landscape Architecture Program, City College of New York, and author of Structures of Coastal Resilience.

“This book is a great resource for students who want to grasp the sort of future they will be designing for, professionals who want to improve their practices today, and for anyone who wishes to turn their climate change depression into meaningful ecological action.”
—Aaron Seward is Editor in Chief at The Architect’s Newspaper and former Editor at Texas Architect.  

“To design is to be optimistic. Designers act with the belief we can make things better. Environmental Activism by Design illustrates this is possible through ethical action, offering hope for a more sustainable and beautiful future, leaving little doubt that we can indeed adapt to climate change and mitigate its deleterious effects.”
Frederick Steiner is Dean at the Stuart Weitzman School of Design, University of Pennsylvania, and author of Human Ecology: How Nature and Culture Shape our World and The Living Landscape.

 “Holding a positive view of our environment as a valuable source of information encourages us to embrace
and study our surroundings, while acknowledging that architectural design does not occur within a vacuum.” 

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