BCYC Immersion
Architecture Track

This track features an extended stay at BCYC Immersion to allow for an Architecture Experience Tour in Kansas City. The tour will include the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Union Station, Country Club Plaza, and a sampling of the most beautiful churches in KC.

Architecture is described as the “Art of Building”. So, why are only some buildings called ‘architecture’? We will look at the history of architecture as an artform under the premise that ideas have consequences even unto the built environment. Great architecture begins with a wonder-filled idea, finds nourishment in the liberal arts, and begins to assume form through a process of drawing—a process distinct to the profession and one that we will explore. From the drafting boards architecture achieves fulfillment in the ‘clothing’ of materials and artistic finishes. We will look at the myriad ways in which architects dress buildings. Historically the classical canons of Decorum, Propriety, and Beauty guided the process of designing and clothing buildings. For example, our ‘fly-over’ of two thousand years of architecture will introduce us to some of the paradigmatic buildings of Western civilization as well as the foundational texts of Vitruvius, Alberti, Palladio, and Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson viewed architecture as uniquely capable of manifesting the core principles of the republic. The influence of his writing and buildings lingers in our towns and cities. The process of uncovering some of those principles will provide some essential clues for grappling with the status of the architectural profession today.

Track Instructor

Dr. Christopher C. Miller
Professor of Architecture

Christopher Miller, in 2019, came to Benedictine and led the development of the first official curriculum for the Architecture Program. He has administrative and teaching experience, first year to graduate students, in the U.S. and in European summer programs, including twenty years in a professional architecture program accredited by the National Architecture Accreditation Board.

The accomplishments, of his students and as emerging professionals, have been recognized: awards in chapter and national competitions of the Institute of Classical Architecture and Art and the Congress for the New Urbanism; publishing in The Classicist journal; admissions to graduate programs at Catholic, Princeton, Yale, and Notre Dame; and the winner of the inaugural Architecture Fellowship for Excellence in Architectural Design Work.

In 2014, Dr. Miller co-authored “Beauty” in the Thriving Cities Project at the University of Virginia Institute for Advanced Studies (moved to the Duke Divinity School Ormond Center for Thriving Congregations and Communities). Published recently are “Shaping the World’s Neighborhoods for Urban Shalom” and "Coding for Community." In press is a review of Architecture and Theology. He is a member of the Scientific Committee for the Journal of Traditional Building, Architecture and Urbanism. He was a featured speaker at the Baylor Symposium on Faith and Culture: Stewardship of Creation on urbanism and sustainability. In recent years he has been invited to review manuscripts for The Embrace of Buildings (2017), Architecture and Sacrament (2020), and Making School Beautiful: Restoring the Harmony of Place (2020).