"Within the global constellation of increasingly connected urban centers, shifts in cultural preferences, design thinking, and spatial signification often reflect transitions in capital forces and economic realities. This spring 2014 course was constructed around the belief that globalization imposes unprecedented forces that directly impact the built environment. The pedagogical focus was twofold: to establish an intellectual framework to understand and embrace the interrelationship between real estate and design, so that design thinking becomes a value-adding and differentiating component in development; and to rethink, anticipate, and reinvent practice paradigms in an academic setting that respond to exigent and transformative environmental, market, and cultural changes."--Publisher's web site (viewed January 11, 2016)