HCAD's Julio Garcia Figueroa's Quest to Merge Prefabrication, Energy Efficiency & Cultural Heritage
University Lecturer Julio Garcia Figueroa at the Hillier College of Architecture and Design (HCAD) looks forward to teaching his course on prefabricated architecture this semester, and in the future, hopes to create a study abroad program to take HCAD students to his native Mexico.
“First, what I’m trying to do is define why it’s important and relevant to construct architecture that’s prefabricated, and the benefits of it,” said Garcia Figueroa. “With that in mind, I’m experimenting with modular buildings because I want to utilize prefabrication to meet a net zero building standard, that is buildings that consume only the energy they produce.”
Garcia Figueroa is interested in passive house standards, where structures are designed to be highly energy-efficient, reducing their ecological footprint and operational costs. He says that they don’t necessarily need to be homes, but these design standards can also be incorporated into multifamily dwellings or other building types.
His research is combining passive house standards and prefabrication to bring sustainability to more people. To make his course more hands-on, he has a property where he’s building a unit and testing all his ideas. The aim is for his students to learn from his research and the prototypes that he’s creating.
When connecting the idea of prefabrication to housing, Garcia Figueroa believes that although these prefabricated units can be built en masse, it may not be the perfect solution. People want to live with a unique identity, he notes, that modular construction doesn’t necessarily offer. Although prefabrication and passive house standards have been researched before, he believes it’s important to incorporate innovative technologies and practices like integrated delivery, lean construction, building information modeling, building life assessment and CNC fabrication.
His expertise in prefabrication and working with containers came in handy in 2020 when he got the call to help design the M2CU, a mobile medical care unit designed from shipping containers.
The collaboration between NJIT, The Tuchman Foundation, and University Hospital in Newark produced a solution to meeting global health care needs during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Garcia Figueroa considers this his most challenging project since arriving to teach at NJIT in 1998. “With the university, first, because of the circumstances, and second because of the short time frame,” he said when asked about how complicated it was to get everything ready for production.
James Chao ’20, interior designer, worked with Garcia Figueroa in the process of designing the M2CU. He remembers how they would get on Zoom calls and work out the design plans virtually. When he visited the factory to take measurements of the containers, there were specific rules that needed to be followed to keep everyone healthy and safe.
“They assigned me this project towards the end of the semester. Around mid-May, we were already working on the design, by June we were building the prototypes, and by mid-July we were having events and doing tests with the units,” he added. “To this day the prototype is on campus across the WEC on Warren Street”.
Garcia Figueroa describes students of HCAD’s interior design program where he teaches design and core courses, as interior architects, equipped with all the latest design tools and technologies.
“We don’t tell our students that they’re interior designers, we tell them that they are architects from the inside to the outside.” he said. “The only difference between them and students of architecture is the context given: Architects receive an open site when starting projects, while our students in the Interior Design program receive a building shell.”
The fact that NJIT opens its doors so that diversity can be celebrated and accepted underlines the fact that every culture has something to contribute to our community.
Beyond the Newark-based testing bed, he looks forward to the possibility of taking his students to Mexico and visiting places like the National Museum of Anthropology and the National Museum of Art. It will be a special achievement for him to share his passion for his homeland and connect it to his teachings at NJIT. “Design rooted on a cultural identity is fundamental to our diversity” he said.
This year NJIT earned the federal distinction of being a Hispanic-serving institution (HSI), becoming one of 22 institutions that are both Hispanic-serving and the highest-rated in research (R1 by Carnegie Classification). NJIT’s total research expenditures top $178 million annually, driving innovation and economic growth while preparing students to become leaders in the technology-dependent economy of the 21st century.
“That’s what makes NJIT a very successful place,” says Garcia Figueroa as he talks about how NJIT is a melting pot of different cultures and ideas. “The fact that NJIT opens its doors so that diversity can be celebrated and accepted underlines the fact that every culture has something to contribute to our community, and we all are better for it.”
