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Ball State is staying ahead of the game.

The BSU College of Architecture and Planning is hosting a historic conference on open architecture. This style provides flexibility and adaptability, giving people who actually live in the cities and towns a voice on how to build their homes.

“Cities and the way that our professional culture is designing them is what I would call relatively static,” said Renee Chow, an Associate Professor at UC-Berkley. “The open building approach has been one that recognizes that cities change over time and that there are different levels of intervention."

The conference brought in representatives from 12 countries. Students and guests took part in design exercises, learning right along with the instructors. A change of pace incorporating hands on work gave them a fresh perspective.

“I think it's really unique how we're building models at the same time,” third-year Urban Planning student Derek Naber said. “Designing, rather than the typical sketching it all and doing plans on drawing in two dimensional space."

Conference chair Stephen Kendall said that he was seeing great enthusiasm this week. This promising showing could lead to another conference next year, possibly outside of the U.S.