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"Lisa Huang’s new book encourages a tactile exploration of building materials that is equal part experimentation and informed risk taking. The text and images share how architects transform materials through stretching, casting, carving, and stacking in well-researched built examples and focused student investigations. By approaching failure, courageous design acts can reveal the synergy between technical construction techniques and aesthetic choices."
- Donna Kacmar, FAIA, Professor

"Lisa Huang’s Learning from Failure in the Design Process looks at the verbs of building – stretching, casting, carving, and stacking – showing how these actions form common languages of process and form across centuries and continents. By parsing construction into these four provocative, inclusive categories, she finds similarities between classic works of ancient architecture such as the Pantheon, modern icons like Scarpa’s Brion Cemetery, and contemporary structures like Allied Works’ Clyfford Still Museum. The result will be a helpful guide for students and a useful provocation for practitioners. Student work that builds on the lessons of these precedents will also be an inspiration to teachers seeking ways to bring building science to the desktop for their students. A remarkable, vital study, Huang’s book re-shapes the way we think about building and fabrication processes in design."
- Thomas Leslie, FAIA, Morrill Professor in Architecture, Iowa State University

"Like a child learning to ride a bike and sometimes skinning a knee, an architect learns about materials, assemblies, construction processes, physics, weathering, and gravity all on the fly, while designing each building. Learning from Failure in the Design Process by Lisa Huang captures the magic that can happen when design thinking is applied to the technical aspects of materials and the making of architecture. This book will help even veteran architects rediscover their craft."
- Patrick Rand, FAIA, DPACSA, Distinguished Professor, NC State University

"Examining an under appreciated aspect of architectural design, Huang reveals the essential connection between material innovation and experimental failure in the development of construction materials and methods. By exploring four fundamental methods of material assembly, and illustrating each section with both precedents from the history of modern building as well as full-scale constructions made by her students, Huang opens up productive paths for further experiments in material assemblies in both the academic and professional contexts, while also bringing to light new insights into the larger discipline of architecture."
- Robert McCarter, Ruth and Norman Moore Professor of Architecture, Washington University in St. Louis

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