MACE: connecting and enriching repositories for architectural learning

Education in architecture requires access to a broad range of learning materials, so as to develop flexibility and creativity in design. The learning material is comprised of textual and visual media including images, videos, descriptions of architectural concepts or projects, i.e. digital artifacts on different aggregation levels. Until now, repositories storing such information have not been interrelated and have not provided unified access. Consequently, finding and retrieving architectural learning objects is cumbersome and time consuming. In this paper, we describe how an infrastructure of federated architectural learning repositories will provide unique, integrated access facilities for high quality architectural content. The integration of various types of content, usage, social and contextual metadata enables users to develop multiple perspectives and navigation paths that support experience multiplication for the user. A standards–based, service– oriented software architecture, and flexible user interface design solutions, based on embeddable widgets, ensure easy integration and re-combinability of contents, metadata and functionalities.