ARCH 345 Urban and Landscape Design Project Brief Spring 2026 | EEFAT University

ARCH 345 Urban and Landscape Design Project Brief 

Project Overview 

This project represents the synthesis phase of the Urban and Landscape Design Course, following the theoretical and historical explorations of the first eight weeks of the semester. Having examined the evolution of urban form from the medieval city to contemporary urbanism, students will now apply these conceptual frameworks to a real-world site in Jeddah, an area that embodies waterfront character and cultural symbolism. 

The Urban Design Project for the Spring 2026 semester focuses on the redesign and transformation of the Waterfront area adjacent to the Al-Amana Building in southern Jeddah. This prominent site sits at the intersection of historic, cultural, and coastal urban layers, offering a unique opportunity to merge cultural sensitivity, public space design, and contemporary waterfront urbanism.  The project seeks to transform the existing vehicular-dominated landscape around Al-Amana Building and its adjoining open areas into avibrant public realm that balances spiritual, cultural, and social functions. Students will reimagine the interface between the coastline and the adjacent urban fabric, proposing interventions that enhance walkability, connectivity, and community life.  The design challenge invites students to explore urban and landscape design strategies that integrate pedestrian circulation, shaded walkways, plazas for public gatherings, small-scale commercial or cultural kiosks, green infrastructure, and waterfront promenade. The goal is to create a cohesive and context-sensitive design that respects the significance of the Al-Amana building and nearby landmarks while revitalising the surrounding area as an inclusive civic destination. 

This project emphasises:

• Contextual and environmental sensitivity to the Red Sea waterfront.
• Integration of public space networks supporting both community and visitor engagement.
• Implementation of sustainable urban design principles, including microclimate control, shading, and material selection suitable for Jeddah’s coastal climate.
• Enhancement of visual and pedestrian connections with Al-Amana and the newly introduced public plaza, and the surrounding neighbourhoods.

Students will work in groups to develop a comprehensive urban and landscape design proposal supported by site analysis, concept development, spatial programming, and fully rendered urban and landscape design drawings. This group project (2-3 students) builds upon the theoretical foundation established during the first half of the semester, applying urban design principles and historical insights to a real-world context. Each team will address key aspects of place-making, mobility, environmental comfort, and social engagement, developing a coherent design vision supported by analytical research, conceptual development, and detailed design proposals.

Design Objectives

Students are expected to address the following objectives through analysis, concept development, and design proposals:

Activate the Public Realm:  

• Transform the currently fragmented and vehicular-dominated environment into a lively, walkable public realm that accommodates diverse community activities, prayer, gathering, recreation, and contemplation.

Celebrate Civic life and the flagpole symbolism: 

• Reinforce the civic function of Al-Amana Building as a significant architectural anchor for the City of Jeddah and the symbolic role of the Flagpole as a national monument, ensuring respectful visual, spatial, and landscape integration.

Enhance Connectivity and Mobility:

• Develop safe, comfortable pedestrian and cycling routes linking the waterfront and adjacent neighbourhoods. Reduce vehicular conflicts and introduce shared space or traffic-calmed zones.

Integrate Sustainable Design Strategies:

• Apply passive cooling, shading, native planting, and material selection that respond to Jeddah’s coastal microclimate and environmental context.

Design for Community and Inclusivity: 

• Provide spaces that encourage social interaction, cultural exchange, and leisure for a diverse range of users, families, worshippers, tourists, and residents.

Shape a Distinct Waterfront Identity: 

• Reimagine the public waterfront space adjacent to the Al-Amana building as a public asset, incorporating plazas, viewing decks, and shaded promenades that celebrate Jeddah’s coastal identity.

Study and Spatial Analysis of the Site Context

Commence your study with a comprehensive historical, geographic, and spatial analysis of the project site, employing Figure-Ground, Linkage, and Place theories as foundational frameworks for understanding its urban dynamics. This analysis will extend beyond the immediate project boundaries to examine the broader spatial relationships, movement patterns, and structural organisation of surrounding neighbourhoods. In addition to these methodologies, you will critically engage with The Image of the City to assess the legibility of the urban environment through elements such as paths, edges, districts, nodes, and landmarks. Furthermore, insights from Responsive Environments will guide your exploration of permeability, legibility, and variety in shaping a successful public space. Jane Jacobs’ principles of vibrant urbanism, such as mixed-use, diversity, active street life, and human-scale design, will further inform your analytical approach, ensuring that proposed design interventions foster connectivity, accessibility, and social engagement. To strengthen your understanding of existing conditions and inform your design proposals, thoroughly review the supplementary resources available on Blackboard. These materials provide essential frameworks for analysing and designing public spaces on Waterfronts. Students are expected to conduct a study of various waterfront projects that encompass examples from local, regional, and global contexts. Students are required to share the results of this study on Blackboard and through a class PowerPoint presentation, with three examples to be incorporated on final project posters.

Project Deliverables

Students will be required to submit:

1. Site Analysis Posters: Including figure-ground studies, linkage diagrams, and urbancontext assessments, and legibility maps. A photographic survey must be included to support the analysis.

2. Conceptual Framework: Case study analysis that includes one example from local, regional, and international contexts.

3. Public Space Master Plan: A comprehensive layout showcasing design interventions.

4. Design Proposals: Spatial configurations, material palettes, landscape strategies, and programming elements. Comprehensive graphic representation of design interventions.

5. Sustainability Strategy: Documenting energy-efficient and environmentally responsible design features. 

This project will unfold in a series of structured stages, with deadlines announced progressively as you advance through each phase of submission. Rather than a static document, this project brief serves as aliving framework, evolving in response to student progress, iterative feedback, and emerging insights. Updates will be provided to refine expectations, clarify objectives, and ensure alignment with the overarching design vision. Your engagement with each stage will shape the trajectory of the project, reinforcing a dynamic, research-driven design process.

Stage 1 Deliverables: Comprehensive Site Analysis Posters (5% of Course Grade)

For the first stage of the project, students will produce well-structured and visually compellingsite analysis posters that demonstrate a deep understanding of the project’s urban context. These posters should synthesise multiple layers of analysis, combining both graphic and written components to articulate key spatial and contextual insights.

Submission Requirements:

• Linkage Diagrams: Map out key circulation routes, movement patterns, and connections between significant urban nodes, including pedestrian flows and vehicular access.
• Urban Context Assessments: Analyse the broader urban dynamics, identifying key districts, edges, landmarks, and transitional spaces that define the project’s setting.
• Legibility Map: Apply Kevin Lynch’s urban design principles ( paths, edges, nodes, districts, landmarks) to assess the clarity and coherence of the public space within its historical and cultural fabric.
• Photographic Survey: A well-curated photographic documentation of the site, capturing key spatial qualities, architectural assets, materiality, and current conditions to support the analysis.
• Design Reflections: A critical synthesis of findings, integrating insights from assigned readings and resources available on Blackboard, demonstrating an informed approach to the site’s challenges and potential.
• Case Studies: Well-presented three examples of comparable waterfront development with reflective analysis of physical, cultural, and social content in addition to unique urban and landscape design details.

Presentation & Submission Format:

Poster Format: 

• Portrait Double A0-sized posters, designed with clarity, professionalism, and strong visual hierarchy.

Submission Deadline: 

• Digital submission on Blackboard is due Thursday, March 5, 2026. Late submissions are not accepted and/or will be subject to a major grade reduction.

This submission serves as the foundation for subsequent design phases, providing the analytical groundwork for developing contextually responsive interventions.

Stage 2 Site Components, Zoning, Programmatic Elements, and conceptual (5% of Course Grade).

The Site Study should address the following key components within the project boundary:

• Al-Amana Side court, Parking, and Entry Zone: Redesign the space Adjacent to Al-Amana Building to enhance its approach, visual prominence, and pedestrian comfort.
• Public Plaza: Create an open, flexible space for community gatherings, small markets, or cultural events.
• Pedestrian Walkways and Landscape Corridors: Introduce a continuous shaded network connecting all activity zones.
• Waterfront Promenade: Extend the site experience toward the Red Sea, integrating seating areas, viewing terraces, and soft landscaping.
• Commercial and Cultural Nodes: Propose cafés with outdoor seating that animate the areawhile maintaining its dignity and serenity.
• Parking and Access Strategy: Reorganise vehicular movement and propose efficient, context-sensitive parking solutions.

Presentation & Submission Format:

Poster Format: 

• Portrait Double A0-sized posters, designed with clarity, professionalism, and strong visual hierarchy.

Submission Deadline: 

• Digital submission on Blackboard is due Monday, April 6, 2026. Late submissions are not accepted and/or will be subject to a major grade reduction.

Stage 3 Design and Landscape Details –  Pre-jury (10% of Course Grade)

Detailed Design and Landscape Elements: Space Furniture, Pavement, Water, Shading, and Materiality 

In this stage, students will move from conceptual and schematic design intodetailed spatialarticulation and material definition. The goal is to demonstrate how the urban experience is shaped through design details, including furniture, paving, textures, shading devices, lighting, and water features. Students must express how these elements support the identity, comfort, and usability of the proposed public space while reinforcing its climatic and cultural context in Jeddah.

Design Focus: The design must demonstrate:

• Integration between architectural edges, soft and hard landscaping, and circulation patterns.
• Human-scale design thinking, how users sit, walk, rest, or gather in the space.
• Environmental comfort, shading, air movement, surface temperature mitigation.
• Materiality and texture that reflect local identity and durability

Design Requirements

Each team must develop detailed drawings and visualisations that address the following landscape and urban design components:

A. Space Furniture and Fixtures

Seating Elements:

• Design various seating types, fixed benches, and integrated edge seating. Consider comfort, ergonomics, orientation (toward shade/views), and social configurations. Use materials suitable for Jeddah’s marine environment (treated wood, steel, concrete, stone).

Urban Furniture:

• Trash bins, planters, bicycle racks, lighting poles, and signage.
• Maintain visual consistency through a coherent design language.
• Integrate lighting within landscape or seating elements where appropriate.

B. Water Features

• Introduce one or more passive or interactive water features that support microclimatic cooling and enhance sensory quality.
• Examples: reflective pools, linear water rills, misting fountains, or shallow interactive surfaces.
• Ensure water use efficiency and consider recycled or grey-water reuse concepts.
• Show lighting integration for nighttime ambience.

C. Pavement and Ground Surfaces

• Develop a comprehensive paving strategy distinguishing between:
• Pedestrian walkways
• Plazas and gathering areas
• Vehicular or service lanes
• Edge transitions (between hard and soft landscape zones)
• Specify textures, colour tones, and materials that reinforce hierarchy and orientation.
• Consider anti-slip surfaces, maintenance, and local material availability (stone, granite, terrazzo, exposed aggregate, etc.).
• Provide pattern diagrams showing geometric composition and material transitions.

D. Textures and Materials

• Apply materials to different hardscape components.
• Paving materials
• Seating and furniture finishes
• Wall or edge cladding
• Shading structure materials (wood, tensile fabric, metal, bamboo, etc.)
• Planting textures (leaf colour, density, height, shade effect)
• Demonstrate how the palette supports the overallatmosphere, identity, and climatic adaptation of the site.

E. Shading and Climate Responsiveness

Design shaded zones using one or more of the following: Climatically responsive, contextual yet contemporary shading structures.
Vegetation-based shading (tree canopies, green walls)
Show the relationship between shading and user comfort (e.g., seating located under shadepaths or near water features).
Integrate solar orientation diagrams or shading analysis to justify design choices.

Poster Format: 
Portrait Double A0-sized posters, designed with clarity, professionalism, and strong visual hierarchy.

Submission Deadline: 
Digital submission on Blackboard is due Wednesday, April. 15, 2026. Late submissions are not accepted and/or will be subject to a major grade reduction.

Stage 4 Final Masterplan, Design, and Landscape Details –  Final jury (30% ofthe course Grade)

The Final Jury represents the culmination of the semester’s design process, synthesising all stages from conceptual development and contextual analysis to detailed landscape articulation. Students are expected to present a coherent, site-responsive, and culturally grounded design proposal demonstrating both visionary and technical proficiency. The presentation should convey how the proposed urban space integrates architecture, landscape, and user experience, while responding to Jeddah’s environmental conditions and the cultural importance of Al-Amana Building and the Flagpole setting.

Scope of the Final Submission

A. Conceptual and Urban Framework

• Site and context analysis summary (key maps, aerials, diagrams)
• Design concept narrative (identity, spatial hierarchy, cultural response)
• Master plan integrating movement, edges, landscape zones, and visual connections

B. Detailed Design

Enlarged plan showing:

• Shading structures and seating arrangements
• Pavement, planting, and water features
• Lighting and furniture integration
• Climatic response strategies

Cross sections (minimum two) showing layering and human scale
3D visualisation/perspective renderings
Illustrative diagrams as appropriate

C. Environmental and Material Strategy

• Microclimate analysis (breeze, solar path, shade distribution)
• Material palette and textures (paving, finishes, vegetation)
• Water use and sustainability concepts (reuse, low-consumption systems)
• Shading systems and environmental comfort diagrams

D. Cultural and Experiential Narrative

• Spatial sequence (arrival, transition, gathering, contemplation)
• Integration with Jeddah waterfront identity
• Reflection of local materials, craftsmanship, and cultural values

E. Presentation Materials

4 double A0 boards (Portrait Orientation) summarising the final design proposal:

1. Concept - Site Context
2. Master Plan - Circulation - Zones
3. Renderings, Material Board, Environmental Diagrams

Digital Submission (PDF) on Blackboard
Optional Model or Walk-through Animation
Site Plan (Scale 1:400 FOR ALL STUDENTS NO EXCEPTION):
(Any deviation in scale will result in grade reduction.) Include the public space and the surrounding roads.
Detail activity zones, paving, planting, benches, and more.

2D & 3D Renderings:

At least two (daytime and nighttime)
Include lighting schemes suitable for Waterfront Development.

AI Explorations (Optional):

Submit AI-generated event or activity scenes in a separate section, clearly marked. Include prompts and source imagery used.

Presentation:

10-minute talk in front of the jury panel. Be clear, concise, and visual.

Submission Timeline:

Digital Submission (Blackboard): 
Tuesday, April 28, 2026, by 7:00 PM 
Note: The Submission link will close after this time.
Jury with Printed Posters:
Wednesday, April 29, 2026, at 8:30 AM.

Final Jury Location: Ground Floor, ARCH Hall
Posters must be posted before 9:00 AM. Late arrivals will not be accepted. Evaluation Rubric (Final Jury). Late submissions are not accepted. 

Digital and Printed Submission Requirements Compliance (Pass/Fail) 

This is a gatekeeping criterion. Any missing submission stage (Digital or Printed) and detailed design requirements (e.g., scaled site plan, 3D renderings, or physical posters) may invalidate the submission or require a grade deduction of up to 50 points, at the instructor's discretion.

Important Note:

For submission preparation, every group must submit an independent Group Work Report (Word file) articulating the collaborative work and individual contribution to project development. This report must be dated and signed by all group members. 

Evaluation Rubric

Jury Expectations 

During the Final Jury, each team will:

• Deliver a 10-minute presentation supported by boards and visuals.
• Explain the design evolution from concept to detail.
• Emphasise user experience and environmental performance.
• Respond to jury questions with clarity, confidence, and depth.