A European-standard second cycle degree course, a first-cycle degree course qualification, a broad network of exchange programs with the EU, Turkey, Malaysia, United States and Eastern European universities, special attention to a project-based culture and new technologies: the Faculty of Architecture "Aldo Rossi" in Cesena is all of this. It is a new learning institution that seeks to train skilled professionals with a broad vision of the whole architectural process - from the blueprint to the final product.
The Faculty of Architecture in Cesena was established by the University of Bologna in the academic year 1999-2000 and entitled to the famous Italian architect Aldo Rossi (1931-1987) in 2005.
This Faculty was set up not just thanks to the ambitions of the University and the social, economic and political bodies of the Romagna region, but also thanks to the determination of a group of lecturers from the Faculties of Engineering, Mathematics, Physics and Natural Sciences in Bologna, who wanted to bring forth the true values and principles of the architectural process.
The Faculty is modern both in terms of its facilities and the way its courses have been organised, over the past few years, yet it is not that young if we consider the teaching and training methods used to forge the new generations of young architects.
The aim is not to become like one of the Faculties of Architecture scattered across Italy, but, rather, thanks to its small intake of students, it represents a way of teaching architecture based on the basic principles of architectural know-how and expertise.
According to Ernesto N. Rogers’ interpretation, our Faculty is supposed to become a "trendy" institution. Consistency, trend-setting and style are not synonymous, but three different stages of the historical process in which the artistic phenomenon develops. ‘Consistency’ is the essential asset of the artist in order to determine his/her own relationship with the moral sphere within the scope of a harmonious scheme so that each action can spring from it. ‘Trend-setting’ is the deliberate transfer of those actions into a well-defined individual artistic method. ‘Style’ is the formal expression of consistency and trend-setting.
The courses provided by the Faculty of Architecture "Aldo Rossi" are mainly based on the three ever-necessary elements of practising architecture itself: history, design and draughtsmanship.
These elements, with their specific aspects, determine the student's academic career for the whole 5-year degree span. They complement one another so that architectural design can be dealt with by paying special attention to the product and its natural context and environment, where the materials, the construction and the representation take on a particular identity and role within the building and urban context. We can quote Milizia: "...and if one wants his drawings to say something, one will not make them say everything he or she has in mind, but only what they need to say. Buildings talk and each citizen will understand their words".
Far from the modern trends and the experimentalism of last decades, we believe that the teaching of architecture has to rediscover the specific elements of a curriculum based on the combination between the sphere of the humanities and the sciences.
Indeed, the new Faculty is the product of the long-established School of Architecture and Engineering in Bologna. The designer and the architect’s education is therefore the supply of a set of skills that are not only related to the project and its techniques, but also to all other elements of the humanities and the sciences that are currently reaching new levels of integration and development. To quote Vitruvio: "The architect will be able to write and draw, have a good knowledge of geometry and he shall not ignore optics, he shall study arithmetic and have a good knowledge of history, philosophy and music".
Today, our society seems to favour the eccentric, the unexpected and the surprise element in a delirious celebration of individualism and this is opposite to the intimate nature of architecture itself.
Graduates from the degree course in Architecture gain specific skills in architectural and urban design, urban planning, architectural restoration and revival, structural and environmental design.
They can therefore perform their jobs as freelance professionals in private and public institutions, operating in the field of constructions and the transformation of cities and the surrounding territory.