Passive solar, daylighting and sustainable design; sustainable systems and urban design principles for transit oriented neighborhoods.
Chosen as the fifth Dean of the College of Environmental Design, Harrison Fraker was educated as an architect and urban designer at Princeton and Cambridge Universities and is recognized as a pioneer in passive solar, daylighting and sustainable design, applied research and teaching. He has pursued a career bridging innovative architecture and urban design education with an award-winning practice. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal for creating a new College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture at the University of Minnesota and was appointed the founding Dean. He was granted Fellowship in the AIA College of Fellows for his distinguished career of bridging education and practice. He has published seminal articles on the design potential of sustainable systems and urban design principles for transit-oriented neighborhoods in China, including the development of the Eco Block concept, the first integrated whole-systems design approach that generates all energy from local renewables and recycles and reuses all water and waste. He stepped down as Dean in June 1908 and became the President of Places Journal Board of Directors in the fall of the same year. He now teaches design studio and believes in integrating pragmatic and theoretical analysis to create new knowledge about critical environmental design challenges facing society. His research on best practices of sustainable neighborhoods globally is summarized in his recently published book, The Hidden Potential of Sustainable Neighborhoods, Sept 2013, Island Press. He currently is the Chair of the Energy Resources Group (ERG), a world renowned, interdisciplinary graduate group on Campus and is also the Ax:son Johnson Visiting Professor in the Sustainable Urban Design (SUDes) Masters program at Lund University in Sweden. He was selected recently to receive the 2014 Topaz Medallion, the highest award given in architectural education by the AIA and the ACSA. He also recently received a $1.5 million research grant from the California Energy Commission entitled: the Oakland Ecoblock – A ZNE, Low Water Use Retrofit Neighborhood Demonstration Project.
2014 recipient of the Topaz Medallion for Excellence in Architectural Education
Foreign Studies: Architecture (1985)
The Hidden Potential of Sustainable Neighborhoods (2013)