In 1894, Bernard Maybeck was appointed instructor in drawing at the Civil Engineering College of the University of California. A school of architecture did not yet exist.[1] The School of Architecture at Berkeley was developed by John Galen Howard in 1903 followed by the School of Landscape Architecture, established by John William Gregg, which began instruction in 1913 and City Planning in 1948. In order to encourage an atmosphere of interdisciplinary study, the three schools, with the Department of Decorative Arts, were brought under one roof and the College of Environmental Design was founded in 1959 by, William Wurster, T.J Kent, Catherine Bauer Wurster, and Vernon DeMars. Originally, the school was located in North Gate Hall. Bauer Wurster Hall, the building which currently houses the college opened in 1964 and was designed by Joseph Esherick, Vernon DeMars, and Donald Olsen, members of the CED faculty.
One of the CED's early innovations during the 1960s was the development of the "four-plus-two" ("4+2") course of study for architecture students, meaning a four-year non-professional Bachelor of Arts in Architecture degree followed by a two-year professional Master of Architecture (M.Arch) degree.[4] The 4+2 program was meant to address the shortfalls of the traditional 5-year professional Bachelor of Architecture (B.Arch) program, which many architecture educators felt was too rushed and neglected the undergraduate's intellectual development in favor of a strong emphasis on practical design knowledge. The 4+2 program allowed one to receive a broader education including exposure to the liberal arts as an undergraduate and thus a deeper and more thorough education in architectural design as a graduate student. CED was also an early proponent of design for disability and green architecture, and is home to the Center for the Built Environment.[5][6]
In 2009–2010, the College of Environmental Design marked its 50th anniversary with a year-long series of events that paid tribute to CED's history and legacy, and engaged the college community in a lively discussion about its future.
In March 2015, the college unveiled a 9-foot-tall (2.7 m) 3D-printed sculpture, entitled "Bloom", which was composed of an iron oxide-free Portland cement powder. This was the first printed structure of its type.[7][8][9]
^Waverly, Lowell; Elizabeth, Byrne; Betsy, Frederick-Rothwell (2009-01-01). Design on the Edge: a Century of Teaching Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, 1903–2003. College of Environmental Design, University of California, Berkeley. ISBN978-0-9819667-3-1. OCLC940646191.
^"About Us". Center for the Built Environment. Retrieved 2013-09-26.
