Mr. Carruthers’ Intro to Art class had a very special visitor when alumnus and architect, Brion Lipschutz ’77, joined the class for an interactive session during our recent Career Week. Mr. Lipschutz, known for designing academic and art buildings on college and university campuses, and for teaching architectural design with Drexel University’s Architectural Engineering program, coached the students on ‘design thinking’ and the basics of architectural drawing.
After a short introduction, Mr. Lipschutz had the class pass around an everyday object–a plastic oat milk bottle–and asked each student to describe something about it. “Design thinking begins with ‘design seeing’, he explained. “Learning to look at everything through this lens requires you to open your eyes and notice the details you would otherwise overlook.”
To illustrate how the concept is applied in the world of architectural drawing, Mr. Lipschutz brought out bright red peppers to demonstrate the difference between a plan, a section, and an elevation. First, he cut a pepper in half horizontally, showing the class the cross-section of the pepper. “This view would be equivalent to a plan, which is from above looking down.” Next, he cut another pepper in half from top to bottom. “When looking into the pepper from the side, this would be a section.” Then, holding a whole pepper upright, he demonstrated the elevation view. To conclude the exercise, each student was given a cut pepper and asked to make a detailed drawing of what they saw, keeping the plan and section concepts in mind.
The next exercise was a still life drawing of a miniature city made of small boxes set up in the center of the classroom. Each student was asked draw the city as an elevation from their vantage point in the classroom. “Elevation has no dimension, so practice seeing the objects as one-dimensional shapes,” continued Mr. Lipschulz.
Later in the day, Mr. Lipschutz remained on campus to participate in 2024 Career Night where he continued to talk with groups of students about his career as an architect, his college experience, and his time at SKS. Thank you to Mr. Lipschutz for sharing time and wealth of knowledge with our students and helping to make Career Week a success!
About Brion Lipschutz ’77
The focus of Brion Lipschutz’s 40-year career as an architect has been the design of academic and art buildings on college and university campuses. Mr. Lipschutz earned a BS in Environmental Design from Philadelphia College of Art and a Master of Architecture from Carnegie Mellon University. He is a registered architect in several states – Pennsylvania, Maryland, and New Jersey; and a member of the American Institute of Architects.
Mr. Lipschutz taught at Drexel University in the Architectural Engineering program, a core foundation class that covered basic architectural drawing principles using three-dimensional abstract and exercises to heighten observation skills. Design exercises were used to emphasize the nature of function, structure, and materials and their impact on the design process.
Mr. Lipschutz has been a principal in the firm Kleinrock Studio Architecture since 2011.
