Here is a list of must-have books:

Video: How to make an attractive City

This video by Alain de Botton, has an unfortunate title. It is about more than the need for making cities "attractive". Instead, the video touches on aspects of city-making that ensures variety and quality of life.

Free online course: Design 1o1 “Redux”

Design 1o1 “Redux”

Although this MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) started in October 2015, it is still accessible, and it is free!

Whether you are curious about architecture, interested in or about to commence with architecture studies, you may find this useful.

If you have been accepted into the part-time BTech Architectural Technology programme at CPUT, this work will form part of the Theory (THD400S) course (year 1) and Applied Design (APD402S)course (year 2). So, get started and save time later! 

Sign up on Iversity and register for the free Audit Track of this 8 week course to get you started on your Architecture journey.

You can find it here: Design 101

What will I learn?

You will learn to develop some basic design attitudes for better understanding the mechanics of today’s world.

One step at a time, you will learn that “design” is foremost a language. A language shared, talked and discussed by designers from all over the world.

How does the world look through the special lenses of "design"?

Along the way, you will learn about a considerably high number of things. Starting from your very own selves.

Prior Knowledge

In terms of prior knowledge, there is nothing required.

If you have a lot of prior knowledge, it might make the learning process more difficult, but don’t worry, no one is perfect. If we talk about contemporary “#design”, we are all absolute beginners!

However, in terms of technical equipment, this course is easier to follow via a smartphone or tablet. Of course, you can follow us via a desktop computer... but this is not how we intended the whole thing to be.

Workload

Between 4 and 7 hours a week.

Everyday, from Monday to Friday, for a total of 6 weeks, you will receive a package via email. Each package will contain a 15-second video to watch (to get you in the proper mood), and a pdf-letter introducing the daily brief (or “homework”) and a series of objects, characters and happenings intertwined with the narrative of the course (to go deeper in the subject at hand).

You will work on your assignment…

Then, once completed, you will upload it to your Instagram account (for the rest of us to see).

Easy as a kiss.

Course Structure

Our various activities will be divided into 8 weeks:

Week 1: My Body

Week 2: My Mind

Week 3: My Time

Week 4: My Diary

Week 5: My Food

Week 6: My Clothes

Week 7: My Exam

Week 8: My Break

Design 1o1 Redux Part 1: Myself

Starting from our very own selves, we will collectively observe, translate and communicate many things, in a series of different ways and projects.

As Protagoras once said, “Man is the measure of all things”. It is the main reason we focus on “ourselves” in this first part of Design 1o1 Redux.

To do so, we will work with all kinds of cool apps for phones and tablets (do you have a smartphone or tablet?). We will also share our works with the others on Instagram, using special hashtags.

Indeed, we will explore a new way to learn a new design.