HISTORY
New "school for architects". In 1987, "Urban Living Design" program was founded in Kyoto Seika University Faculty of Arts Department of Design.
It was to cultivate architects, not to train engineers or foster general architecture knowledge. Japan had not seen such a school in its 100 year history of architecture education. Seika's approach created a stir in the Japanese architecture community.
Atsushi Ueda (previously Professor at Osaka University) led the team consisting of Atsushi Katagi(currently Professor at Nagoya University), Atsuko Tanaka, Riken Yamamoto (currently Professor at Kogakuin University) and Shin Takamatsu (currently Professor at Kyoto University Graduate School).
Architects and designers were astonished to see up and coming new architects such as Yamamoto and Takamatsu take part in education.
In 89, Katagi was replaced by Takayuki Suzuki, a young architect who had also made a debut as a writer winning the prestigious Gunzo Prize for New Writers. Then, Kiyokazu Arai leading member of Morphosis, and Tsutomu Hayama who had steadily been building his reputation joined the team. They now form the core members of the faculty.
The program was renamed "Architectural Field". However, the question remained. What is an "architect"? Its definition has shifted with the transformation into the current century. We must launch a new "school for architects". Just as we thought, the Faculty went through reformation. Architectural Field made a decision. We should review the education from its roots and reembark as a Department of Architecture in the Faculty of Design.