Interior Architecture Masters Theses
Interior Architecture offers the following degree program options at the graduate level:
• Master of Arts (MA) in Adaptive Reuse, a one-year+ program
• Master of Design (MDes) in Interior Studies / Adaptive Reuse, a two-year+ program
• Master of Design (MDes) in Interior Studies / Exhibition + Narrative Environments, a two-year+ program
Both programs take an innovative and progressive approach to addressing design issues intrinsic to the reuse and transformation of existing structures. US News & World Report and Design Intelligence have both ranked RISD’s Interior Architecture programs among the top in the country.
Each MA candidate produces a final project that begins with a research component in the fall and evolves into a studio/design project in the spring. MDes candidates demonstrate competency through self-directed Degree Projects that include a seminar on theory, a research component and a studio component. Each DP focuses on the transformation of an existing structure of their choice in the city of Providence. All MA and MDes candidates also participate in the RISD Graduate Thesis Exhibition, a large-scale public show held annually.
Graduate Program Director: Markus Berger
These works are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Theses from 2024
Revitalizing Decay, Owen Carey
RECLAIMED BY ROOTS, Dongyang Chen
A Living Storyscape, Vivian Combariza
Emotional Factory, Yukun Cui
Witnessing Timelessness: Revitalizing Heritage Tourism in the Ruins of Saudi Arabia, Reem Habis
City Sonatas, Duoduo Lin
Other Angles: Queer-ing Approaches to Museum Design, Gregory Mathieu
Homeward Bound: moving homes, moving home, Ella Nadeau
-ing: Heritage as a Verb, Eunji Park
Milpa: Cultivating Community Through Grid Remediation in México, Marianna Pasaret Molinar
Space Between: Navigating Openness, Torie Stotz
Making Room, Rachel Strompf
Celestella Resonance, Xuanren Wang
Echoes of Heights: Sustaining Tradition for Education and Community in the Tibetan Plateau, Junyue Wen
Recomposing Museums: Designing Rhythmic Experiences for Short Attention Spans in the Digital Age, Yujiang Wu
Gender Mirror: Giving women's perspective to men through exhibition, Jiaxuan Xu
Beyond Display: Crafting Emotional Journeys for Belonging and Connectivity, Jiamin Yang
Exploring the versatility of clay in double curvature surface formation, yicheng zhang
Bridge Between Calligraphy and Architect, Tianhao Zhong
忘年交 / A Friendship That Transcends Age, Zichen Zhou
Theses from 2023
the people's food project, Grace Barrett
Kala in my Moholla - art in my neighborhood, Priyata Bosamia
Nature as Material, Time as Tool, Chuchu Chen
FROM VAULT TO PLATFORM （Democratizing Museums through the Lens of the Metaverse））, Zhaoyang Cui
Intensifying the Experience of Contemporary Art, Wanjin Feng
Manifesto of Poor Images: Re-imagine Guggenheim in the Post-digital Age, Mengning He
Adding Subtraction: Wasting Time in Space, Daeun Kim
NEW CHAPTER, Gunju Kim
A Cloud Above, Jiwon Kim
Greening Seoul : A New Toolkit for Adaptive Reuse, Woojae Kim
A.R. Futuristic Scenario in Seun, Yookyung Lee
Eviction to Placement: Rethinking the current supportive housing systems for hidden homeless families, Fang-Min Liou
The Mobile Senior University, YOUSHURUI LI
making pla(y)ces: softening the city through play, Shivani Pinapotu
Interstice, Shravan Rao
Overlooked Modi Vivendi, Natalia Silva
Chinese tea ceremony spirit revival, Hongli Song
Nurturing Haven: A Safe Place for Single Mothers, Meng Su
A Day Stood Still, Yuting Sun
Imaginatorium for children with visual impairment, Xueyun Tang
Reconcile Liminality, Zefeng Wang
Illusion of Consumption, Architectural Rebellion: Unraveling the Maze of Consumption, Xinjie Xiang
Interactive Architecture - Intervention of Virtual Business on Commercial Space, Yihao George Xu
Glowing Under the Bridge—A Healing Space for Wounded Souls, Ruier Zhao
Moving Narration: A journey through history, Yincheng Zhu
Finding Psychological Healing in College Settings, Dici Zou
Theses from 2022
Notes in improvisation : Spatializing Black Identity through music, Esther Akintoye
Dying differently: designing a death-oriented psychedelic treatment center, Grace Caiazza
Blurred lines : Border crossing between Macau and Zhuhai, Weiwei Chen
Regenerative residences: shrinking stress levels in the sky, Peter de Lande Long
Adaptive reduce: forging architectural futures through degrowth, Erika Kane
Unfolding embodied experience: a process-driven immersive exhibition design model, Mooa Seongah Kang
Block Chain Home, Jonggun Lee
Last sunset : design to alleviate social isolation for Chinese elderly, Linghui Li
Rebuilding Collective effervescence : a "Ballroom" for post-pandemic revelry, Di Ma
Re:Connection: exercises in unplugging and mindfully reconnecting, E. J. Roseman
Dear City, give me some space; creating space for ephemeral forces in a city, Abinaya Sivaprakasam Thamilarasan
From invisible to visible: the third wave/way of intervention for Dashilar, Jiali Tian
Endless construction : occupant activism and authorship, Jiayi Wang
Beyond Spectacle : parametric design to life in space, Ding Xu
Design for designers : An incubator for young designers to grow, Jiajie Yang
The Cthulhu Journey : storytelling through an architectural immersive experience, Rui Zhang
Theses from 2021
Posthuman ecologies, Christine Chang
Loneliness / Togetherness : Interiority and connection under isolation, Huaqin Chen
Space between memories: pause, Young Jae Cho
Cultural acupuncture: decentralization and deocratization in Chinese exhibition design, Ruohan Duan
Adaptive reuse as evidence of scientific progress: recontextualizing a space for growing knowledge, Kayci Gallagher
Reclaiming modern architecture: an urban visual narrative of Kuwait City, Yara Hadi
Unraveling the living: reframing cramped housing as a social living, Dong-zoo Han
Beyond pasta: understanding Italian American culinary culture in Federal Hill, Chufan He
Going back, Zhiyi Hilary He
Augmented city, Xing Huan
Woven healing: reimagining the rural health center, Mahasweta Jayachandran
Living · Sharing · Connecting : rebirth of Longchang Apartments Heritage Community, Linhong Jiang
Migrating architecture: vernacular futurism, Yichu Jiang
The second home: breaking the cycle of lonely death, Woohee Kim
Reinforcing connection within collective housing: a new vision of Red Steel City, Guangyi Niu
Ascents and descents in the 21st Century: restoring Chand Baori, Japneet Pahwa
Nossa quadra, nossa historia: the power of collaborative and communal outdoor spaces as a tool for belonging & agency, Rebecca Maria Pepl
Terminal: through the "windows" of a Tram Car Museum, Yuyi Si
Ritualizing of space in the 21st century: fostering of communal identity through celebration of Tamil culture, Mridula Swaminathan
Sensory refreshment: TCM reconsidered, Ni Tang
Remember me: how we can modify the home for people with dementia, Wenjin Wang
The retrieval of memory: holding time in the Shanghai gasometers, Liman Wei
Fostering cultural understanding: mirroring ways of living in Providence, RI, USA and Beijing, PRC, Jiarui Tina Wu
The future of Beijing urban courtyards, Zhuoqi Xu
Remembering Chinatown: a fusion of food, identity, & memory, Robert Yang
Overflowing boundaries: competition and mutualism in urban villages, Chen Zhang
Rural acupuncture: carefully introducing tourism within an underground village, Shangyun Zhou
Theses from 2020
Lacunae in the urban landscape, Meriem Aiouna
Melting away - Ilha Formosa, Hao-Chun Chang
Behind appearance : hidden dimensions in the work of Wassily Kandinsky and Paul Klee, Ning Ding
Realistic utopia : utopian architecture exhibition at Arcosanti, Xiao Fang
Contextualize, Jiaai He
Community pop-up galleries : the instruction manual, Mary Iorio
Living under surveillance, Fan Jia
Urban memory : Beijing City wall ruins reconstruction & exhibition, Yuan Jin
Dialogue across time : Atlanta, 1996 and 2020, Qianyu Liu