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Jonathan Ochshorn

  • Professor Emeritus

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Academic Research Areas

  • Architectural technology
  • Structures in architecture
  • Sustainability

Jonathan Ochshorn began teaching at Cornell University in 1988, having previously taught at the City College of New York while working with community groups in New York City. He is the author of OMA’s Milstein Hall: A Case Study of Architectural Failure (2023); Building Bad: How Architectural Utility is Constrained by Politics and Damaged by Expression (2021); and three editions of the textbook, Structural Elements for Architects and Builders. Additional publications include studies on tapered insulation, column buckling, building failures, the relationship of design theory to technical practice, and strategies for teaching structures to architects. Professor Ochshorn has taught required courses in construction technology and structures, as well as electives on fire safety and the science and politics of green building. He is a registered architect with an academic background in urban design (CCNY M.U.P. ’86), structural engineering (MIT ’76, no degree conferred), as well as architecture (B.Arch. ’75).

Person with blue jean shirt, grey beard, and grey hair

Academic Research Areas

  • Architectural technology
  • Structures in architecture
  • Sustainability

Locked into this endless competition / Your foolish passion and your foolish heart / Can't escape this mindless repetition / You're a prisoner of fashion, a prisoner of art.

Books

Publications

Selected Awards, Grants, and Fellowships

  • Fulbright Scholar Award

    School of Architecture, Tianjin, China
    2016–17

  • Fulbright Senior Specialist Award

    Chiang Mai University, Thailand
    2001