PJ Dick Innovation Fund Teaching Grant: Unlikely Hybrids

Unlikely Hybrids
Jared Abraham, Associate Studio Professor, Carnegie Mellon Architecture

Course offered Spring 2026 | 12 students

This Options Studio course aims to build a body of knowledge surrounding the widely unexplored hybrid-typology of office-to-residential conversion. The studio treats the conversion of Pittsburgh's vacated office buildings as a design research project, the outcome of which will directly contribute to the emerging dialogue surrounding this new building type. Through a series of speculative design inquiries, this studio will explore the potential for this project type to produce innovative solutions for affordable housing while leveraging the unique potentials afforded by the act of typological hybridization (i.e. home / office).

Recognizing the uncanny nature of the hybrid, we ask the question(s): How might the deserted core-and-shell office building lay the groundwork for new forms of domesticity? What design opportunities or potentialities exist in this new milieu? Is Pittsburgh truly a “[C]ity of misfits and hybrids... consisting of renegade assemblies and odd kinships” as Ferda Kolatan would suggest? If so, how might these odd kinships manifest in this new architectural assemblage?

This studio aims to directly address climate change by engaging the subjects of sustainable design and adaptive reuse, leveraging the embodied energy of existing infrastructure for new uses. Furthermore, this studio will address issues of social justice by developing affordable housing typologies that aim to provide rights and resources, regardless of background, identity or socio-economic status. 

Image: The Floor Plan Manual Housing - 5th Edition.