Taubman College Presents 2025 Master of Architecture Thesis Awards
Taubman College recognized seven graduating students in the master of architecture program for their final thesis proposals this spring. In addition to an overall award and student voice award, awards were presented in various categories, including representation/new media, materials/tectonics/modeling, theory/history/framing, and environmental impact.
Following is a list of finalists, winners, as well as an excerpt from each winning thesis:
BURTON L. KAMPNER AWARD FOR BEST THESIS
Winner
Jonathan Bam Davis, “Disaporic Observatory of Critical Vodou Studies”
(Studio: “Constructed Actors.” Anya Sirota)
“This thesis draws from Theaster Gates’ Stony Island Arts Bank, The Center for Land Use Interpretation, and speculative preservation practices to argue that architecture cannot be neutral; it is a tool for rewriting, assembling, and actively producing knowledge. Through an exploration of zombi, vodou, digital remnants, and speculative artifacts, this project challenges architecture’s traditional role, constructing spaces that do not merely house memory but perform its reconstruction.”
GENERATIONAL VOICE AWARD (Student Vote)
Winner
Shannon Sumner, “Structures of Power, Spaces of Resistance”
(Studio: “MASA: Mexico Architecture Studio Alliance. Filthy, Sprawling, Dangerous.” Dawn Gilpin with Robert Adams)
“My thesis began as an effort to design accessible spaces beyond ADA compliance, but through deeper research into the history of disability and its architectural manifestations, I uncovered a fundamental truth: exclusion is not an oversight—it is an intentional feature embedded within architectural traditions. The built environment has been systematically designed to serve a narrow range of bodies while marginalizing others. This reality demands a reckoning. If architecture is to serve all people, it must be dismantled and reimagined—not as an extension of entrenched biases, but as a site of collective accountability, adaptation, and inclusion.”
REPRESENTATION/NEW MEDIA
Winner
Martin Rodriguez, “Digital Primitivism”
(Studio: “Constructed Actors.” Anya Sirota)
“Digital Primitivism challenges both modernist essentialism and the algorithmic reduction of identity. It does not seek nostalgia, but refusal. Laugier, Semper, and Viollet-le-Duc saw the primitive hut as a foundational form, a statement of necessity. Modernism transformed it into a universal system, in which shelter became function and function became control. But architecture is no longer about dwelling—it is about storage, classification, and surveillance. Digital Primitivism does not recover origins; it exposes their contradictions. It resists the drive to categorize, amplifying absence, turning function into paradox.”
Finalists
- Alexa Chiroussout, “Blind Spots”
- Holly Chu, “Spirit, Script, and Shelter”
- Jonathan Bam Davis, “Disaporic Observatory of Critical Vodou Studies”
- Michael Katsimakas, “Outposts of Autonomy”
- Roy Khoury, “Woah, Degrow!”
- Matthew Mansour, “Geologic Mechanisms”
- Patrick Wilton, “Architectures of Indulgence”
- Judy Zhang, “The Ordinary Utopia (Kids Version!)”
MATERIALS/TECTONICS/MODELING
Winner
Jiashu Sun, “Integrative Tectonics”
(Studio: “Tectonic Arguments.” Jose Sanchez)
“This thesis explores how architectural tectonics, by incorporating natural systems, can contribute to the physical and spiritual health of its inhabitants. By proposing the design of a hospice center, the study interrogates the emotional link that patients can develop with the building through care-oriented design tactics. Traditionally, architecture has been predominantly perceived as a tool for functional efficiency, often overlooking the emotional connections between individuals and their surroundings. However, when architectural space transcends mere structural support and aesthetic form, and instead is attuned to elements such as light, airflow, views, and materiality, it fosters a holistic mind–body experience conducive to healing. The strategic integration of natural elements not only creates serene environments and auditory experiences but also maintains privacy and safety while nurturing a profound connection to the external natural world.”
Finalists
- Kenda Blanks, “West Side Yucca”
- Hargun Chawla, “Edifice Tellurian”
- Marianna Godfrey, “Chinampas and Abastos”
- Srinjayee Saha, “INTERLOCK”
- John Spraberry, “Cadaretta Transition Cookbook”
- Youzhu Tao, “Loading Space”
THEORY/HISTORY/FRAMING
Winner
Martin Rodriguez, “Digital Primitivism”
(Studio: “Constructed Actors.” Anya Sirota)
Finalists
- Trevor Hibbs, “Place vs. Space”
- Brian Kim, “Unearthing Tradition”
- Kenneth Lowery II, “Beyond the Surface: The Power of Symbolism”
- Nahj Marium, “Ecological para-site”
ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT
Winners
Shane Herb, “An Architecture of Residuals”
(Studio: “Constructed Actors.” Anya Sirota)
“Sustainable architecture remains tethered to a paradigm of mitigation—deploying “green” technologies to minimize carbon footprints while neglecting the material and spatial implications of its own interventions. What if architecture engaged directly with the detritus of renewable energy, embedding its byproducts within domestic space? Could this reposition sustainability as a condition of flux rather than a reductive metric of efficiency?”
Megan Kortenhof, “Architectures of Accompaniment”
(Studio: “Constructed Actors.” Anya Sirota)
“Through a lens of critical ethnography, the thesis interrogates how architecture might facilitate not just the logistical realities of retreat, but also the social and affective dimensions of forced migration. How might architecture accompany displacement in
ways that recognize grief, continuity, and adaptation as essential to spatial design? Can impermanence itself be formalized as a condition of cultural conservation, not through static preservation but through the design of transition? By reconsidering architecture’s relationship to mobility, contingency, and embedded cultural memory, this thesis speculates on alternative modes of practice—ones that do not simply mitigate loss, but actively shape the spatial and temporal experience of leaving.”
John Spraberry, “Cadaretta Transition Cookbook”
(Studio: “Degrowth, Low-tech, and Alternative Hedonism.” McLain Clutter and Mireille Roddier)
“This thesis depicts transitions to post-growth futures for the land practices, social
organizations, and physical infrastructures of Cadaretta, a prototypical rural community in Mississippi. It suggests agricultural and settlement pattern transitions at multiple scales, from the regional to the architectural, and between value systems, shifting between prioritizing capital accumulation to fostering regional sufficiency.”
Finalists
- Julia Bohlen, “Agents, Actors, and Augmentation of the [Sens]ible City”
- Sakshi Doshi, “Out of Si(gh)te”
- Tyler Jensen, “SAGINAutonomy”
- Jinyu Li, “AgriReach”
- Varun Vashi, “Hydrofutures South Nevada”
This year’s M.Arch Thesis Coordinator was Thom Moran. Thesis faculty for 2024-2025 were McLain Clutter + Mireille Roddier, Adam Fure + Thom Moran, Dawn Gilpin with Robert Adams, Perry Kulper, Steven Mankouche, Jose Sanchez, Anya Sirota, and Kathy Velikov.
This year’s Thesis reviews took place on April 30 – May 1, 2025, with Visiting Critics:
- Xavi Aguirre
- Carlo Berizzi
- Assia Crawford
- Dora Epstein Jones
- Lior Galili
- Deborah Garcia
- José Ibarra
- Daniel Koehler
- Felipe Orensanz
- David Salomon
- Lola Sheppard
- Mark Stanley
- Lee Vinsel
- Mason White
