Research Paper: “Architecture, Building and Planning” – Detailed Guide to Succeed Academically

Nowadays, architecture is definitely one of the most written about issues, the main reason being the fast advancement of building techniques that lead to its omnipresence. Collecting materials for writing a research paper on Architecture, Building and Planning is now an easy thing due to the increase in the number of books, online blogs, articles, YouTube videos and even movies about the subject. Yet, crafting a quality research paper is a sort of art where special attention should be paid to the technical writing.

Given below are some architecture research paper tips that will help you produce a persuasive research paper on the given topic. It is highly important for you to be up-to-date since you’re working with the rapidly developing area. Ensure that you’re aware of the latest innovations, inventions and how they function. Chances are you’re going to fail if you dedicate your research to the outdated technologies and techniques. With the right planning and this architecture research paper guide, you can generate a supreme quality research paper.

OK, What Is Research?

As stated by Booth, Colomb, and Williams, the “research is like gold mining.” It’s all about “gathering the details you need to answer a question and solve a particular problem.” For instance, if you’ve chosen the topic that sounds like “Impact of Globalization on Architecture” and you’re busy gathering information to be able to answer the paper question and the ones that you may encounter along the way, it is important to mention the improvements that the impact of this kind usually causes, as well as mention any possible declination and concerns in the fields discussed by the experts. To do that, you should be consulting the trusted sources, such as articles from the conferences, articles from edited magazines and books, articles from journals, etc. However, the articles published only on the web are not necessarily considered reliable sources and should be utilized carefully.

Choose & Narrow Your Topic

Hopefully, by now you’ve chosen the most suitable topic and have conducted most of your research. One of the things that you might find challenging is a large amount of information you’ve collected and choosing the pieces that can be included in the project. To ease the process, ensure to develop questions that can be quickly answered from what you have read to this point. Let’s check some of the questions. They should be from who, when, what, why and where variety. For instance, suppose that you’re researching the topic of today’s architectural trends that are going to define the next decade. You might begin with a couple of very high-level questions that your project will answer, like:

• Where Is the Place of the Trends in the Larger Topic of the Architecture and Building?
• Is It Found in Any Other Categories of Research? Is it Somehow Related to any Other Research Areas?
• What Is the History of the Architectural Development and Implementation?
• Who Has Made Advances in Architectural and Building Development?
• What Is the Importance of Those Advances? Why Are They Significant?
• What Is Good about the Rapid Changes in the Field of Architecture, Building and Planning? What Impact Have These Changes Had on Our Lives?

You will find a bunch of possible answers to the questions mentioned above, and your task here is to narrow down what you’re going to include in your paper to a more manageable issue. You might even decide that the transformations that take place in the world of architecture and building as a topic is too wide and that you should better focus on “Reasons for the Development of Gothic Architecture?”, thereby focusing on more specific issues.
Here are some hooking topics to get you started:

• The Brief History of Frank Lloyd Wright’s Architecture Style
• Sustainable Architecture and Its Applications
• Building Restoration: the Advantages and Disadvantages of the Issue
• Development of Architecture In the Times of Industrial Revolution
• The Birth of Modern Architecture: Maison Domino and Self Referential Sign

The Introduction of an Architecture Research Paper: Samples by Our Writers

In this part of your research paper, you’re required to introduce your topic and enlighten your readers about the issue you investigate. The first step in the production of content for your introducing section is to provide the thesis statement or the so-called focus point of the assignment. The thesis statement or the main idea of your project is the actual reason why you write the research paper. It will provide your target readers with the details they need to know about your subject matter. The opening part will explain how the issue fits into a larger context, include the reasons why this topic is important, and give a quick overview of the architecture historical context.

The introduction of the architecture and building research paper is also the place, where the author should sum up his/her findings and tell the readers where all the information presented there will take them later. The point here is that a research paper is not a mystery of any kind. You don’t have to play hide-and-seek! After reading it, an individual should have a clear idea of where it’ll lead him/her to.

Use an attention grabber to hook your audience:

• ‘Early architecture had 2 key functions. First, to consolidate power and security. Second, to please the gods.’
• ‘According to the Greek historian Herodotus, it took 400 000 men and 20 years to create this great monument.’
• ‘One of the most famous computer games The Sims was originally created as an architecture simulator.’
• ‘The largest art gallery in the world is the Winter Palace and Hermitage in Saint Petersburg, Russia. Once you get there, you have to walk 15 miles to see all the 322 galleries, where almost 3 million works of art are presented.’

Professional writers recommend working on the opening segment of the technology research paper after writing the body and the conclusion of it.

The Body of an Architecture Research Paper

After the introduction, you provide the sections of your research paper in the way that will make it easier for you to organize the project messages and the related supporting evidence. You might create an initial segment that defines your issue by way of example. If you managed to devise a solution to a particular problem, it’s recommended to provide a separate section for it. The sections will help you to break your message into logical segments.

The research papers in architecture comprise the following sections: Methodology, Results and Discussion. The author is supposed to explain what he/she did, what kind of results came out, and give a detailed discussion of the results.

It is essential to inform your target audience on where you might move from this point with your research, or what questions still require the answers. Try to tell your reader what work should be done in order to handle all the problems that remain. Or, as an alternative, feel free to speculate on what results that you’ve come up with will lead to sooner or later.

The Conclusion and How to Master It

In this section, you restate your topic, sum up your findings and explain why those are important. Briefly summarize what you’ve presented to your target readers in a short package. A single sentence is usually enough to restate the architecture research paper topic. An example would be if you were working on a research paper on the relationship between politics and architecture, you might say something like “If architecture is used as a special tool to represent strength and power for a certain society, it would play a crucial part in changing history and effect the culture of the globe as Frank Lloyd once said “The mother art is architecture. Without an architecture of our own we have no soul of our own civilization”.

Sum up your main points in order to remind your audience what you’ve told them about in the body of the research paper. To do so, make sure to re-read the topic sentence of every major section or paragraph in the body.

Provide CTA where appropriate. A call to action in the research paper in the field of architecture would be as the following:

• “Without a doubt, all the above are interwoven and affect one another one way or another. Thus, they must be properly combined to support one another. It is also obvious that economic and environmental factors have a huge effect on the success of the design elements of the kind. Nevertheless, it is important to strive for a complementary economic, social and environmental strategy in order to maximize community benefits.”
• “Further research in the area of sustainable building will advance this developing technology and provide direct proof of its health-related and economic advantages, encouraging its greater adoption.”
• “Without a doubt, interventions of the built environment provide an opportunity to prevent crime through fostering life on the streets and building communities, as well as educating social sustainability in big cities. Urban Planners, Architects and many other design experts have to take into account the surrounding environment in order to reduce crime rates. This intervention also needs a properly functioning criminal justice and police force systems together with a model of economic development that provides excellent opportunities to eliminate poverty and cut social inequality.”

Provide the answer to the “So, what?” question. The ending part of the architecture research paper is your last chance to explain the broader context of the subject matter you’ve been exploring. Use the conclusion as a tool to help your readers realize why your topic matters. Give an answer to the “So, what?” question because not every reader understands why your research is that important. For instance, if you’re writing a research paper on the use of green architecture design elements in the developed countries, then you might discuss how the details you shared may help your readers to see how the things are going with the issue in their own country.

Reference
This part of your research paper should include the references to the works you’ve cited within your project. It is not allowed to use endnotes or footnotes in place of this part of the text. There are some formats that are acceptable here, according to the Chicago Manual of Style. Make sure to pick one and format each reference according to it. You may be required to input your resources in accordance with APA (American Psychological Association, Chicago style, ASA (American Sociological Association) or MLA (Modern Language Association) style guidelines. In the following examples, “Penrose AM” and “Katz SB” are the authors, and “Writing in the Sciences: Exploring Conventions of Scientific Discourse” is the title of the book. The publisher is St. Martin’s Press, located in New York. The date of publication is 1998.

• APA: Penrose AM, Katz SB. (1998). A history of western architecture. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
• MLA: Penrose, Ann; Katz, Steven. A history of western architecture. New York: St. Martin’s Press; 1998.
• ASA: Penrose, Ann; Katz, Steven. 1998. A history of western architecture. New York: St. Martin’s Press.
• Chicago: Penrose, Ann; Katz, Steven. A history of western architecture. New York: St. Martin’s Press; 1998.

Keep in mind that ASA and APA are the most popular styles used in the sciences. These two items value the date and place it closer to the beginning of the reference. MLA and Chicago are used most often in the humanities, pushing the date to the end of the reference.