This 16-week immersive program offers a full-time, architecturally focused design/build experience. The journey starts with an intensive in design, architecture, and drawing, where students work together to collaboratively design a small, year-round structure. Once the client approves the design, the group moves to the job site to build the very structure they’ve created.

The program's multidisciplinary curriculum is seamlessly integrated, with lectures, seminars, discussions, studio work, and on-site construction all reinforcing and enhancing each other while contributing to the group design/build project. Students collaborate closely, with the project serving as the central focus. The classroom setting mirrors a professional studio or job site, with instructors serving as mentors, guiding students as they bring their creative visions to life.

Each year presents a unique challenge as the project drives the program. Past projects have ranged from backcountry cabins and tiny houses to custom-built homes.

Launched in 2011, the Design/Build Semester is a collaboration between Yestermorrow Design/Build School (Waitsfield, VT) and the Department of Architecture at UMass Amherst (Amherst, MA). Students can earn 15 credits upon successful completion of the program.