School Notes: School of Architecture
November/December 2026

A complete campus

The 2026 Jim Vlock First Year Building Project, debuting on October 15, is the capstone of an initiative launched in 2022 in partnership with the Friends Center for Children: to provide rent-free housing for the center’s early childhood educators on a roughly two-acre plot within walking distance of its schoolhouse on East Grand Avenue. The village comprises four building project houses. The first, built in 2023, was constructed alongside an existing brick home. The 2026 project, a two-story house that steps down into a single story, marks the southern boundary of the campus. The campus also includes a community room and landscaped areas for play and enjoyment. (Read the Yale Alumni Magazine feature on the project.)

Living systems

The Yale Center for Ecosystems in Architecture (Yale CEA), in collaboration with an interdisciplinary team of academic and industry partners, has published a new study on the potential for plant-based biofilters to help reduce indoor CO2 to levels below those found outdoors. Conventional HVAC systems cannot achieve this through ventilation alone, making this approach increasingly relevant as climate change drives higher CO2 concentrations and greater demands on indoor environments. The researchers found that relatively simple design choices, particularly airflow and lighting design, can dramatically change how well these systems perform. The study was published in the November 15 issue of Energy and Buildings.