Shan Masuda

Shan Masuda is an architecturally trained multimedia designer. His unique intuitive approach relates: cultural, technological, historical, environmental, economic and theoretical forces to materialize the intentions of the client on the site. A graduate of UC Berkeley's, College of Environmental Design, he has worked as a designer in the Bay Area for 12 years. Shan is currently dividing his time between teaching architecture studios at Diablo Valley College in Pleasant Hill, CA and his practice.

After UC Berkeley and an internship with the CoHousing Company, Shan founded a multimedia studio, Internet Atelier. Clients included: federal agencies and local tech related companies, much of the work revolving around the development of metadata standards for the world wide web. Having long held a dueling relationship between emerging technological systems and those of nature and traditional culture, he next transitioned to a design position at DSA Architects, a local firm focused on using alternative materials, appropriate technology and novel construction methods to create sustainable buildings. Shan further explored the use of alternative architecture in common space reclamation work at the grassroots level, cofounding, Dig Coop in 2005. An interdisciplinary organization comprised of, permaculturalists, educators, a horticulturalist, an ecologist, a contractor, and Shan as a designer, Dig worked with local, cities, organizations and youth to push forward sustainable urban infrastructure.

In 2008, Shan founded, Ethnotecture, as a deeper next urban design approach. Employing a focus on cultural ecology, Ethnotecture's work is the cultivation of the urban infrastructure, utilizing technological innovation and ecological principles to architecturally support a dynamic and homeostatic urban home. Elegance, beauty and the ethos of prior architectural and lifestyle practices hint at the direction of emerging design. 

In addition to architectural design studios in the Fall 2014 semester, Shan will offer a studio in, Modular Spatial Information Architecture, a developing interest. More broadly, he is continuing to refine his design vocabulary into a simpler, more effective and fluid language. 

Please visit these great websites:

www.cityrepair.org
www.dsaarch.com
www.adpsr.org
www.baylocalize.org
www.dig.coop
http://apcollaborative.org
http://www.cohousingco.com/