UVA School of Architecture Launches “Leftovers” Series with Support from UVA Arts Council

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The UVA School of Architecture is pleased to announce that its communications team has secured a $10,000 UVA Arts Council Grant to produce Leftovers: Rethinking Waste in Design, a spring 2026 exhibition and public program series inviting the A-School and University community to rethink how we make, reuse, and imagine materials—and more holistically, environments—in a time of climate urgency. As the unit responsible for coordinating and promoting School-wide public programming—and attuned to the research and design interests of our community through ongoing storytelling—the communications team recognized an opportunity to translate these ideas into a series of creative learning experiences and collaborative partnerships. 

Inspired by student advocacy efforts, faculty-led research, and growing concern about the environmental and health impacts of commonly used design materials and building practices, Leftovers foregrounds sustainability, creative reuse, and ethical making as central to design education today. At the most local level, last year, more than 170 students and 12 faculty members signed a student-led petition to ban petrochemical foam from Campbell Hall, citing its harmful effects on both human health and the environment. In 2023, the school’s IT department reported that the A-School produced over 500,000 square feet of printed paper—four times the square footage of Campbell Hall. 

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(left) Detail from Circular Chromatics, recipient of the 2023 ACSA Design Build Award, developed through a course taught by Kyle Schumann in which students deployed biomaterials, including paper pulp. Courtesy Kyle Schumann. (right) Recess is a respite pod for children designed and built by JT Bachman and Samuel Orlando (BSArch '24) that is made with upcycled materials from the A-School's Fabrication Lab. Courtesy JT Bachman.

Faculty and student research is already responding to these challenges. Assistant Professor Kyle Schumann, director of the Before Building Laboratory, is working with students on Possibilities in Pulp, a project testing whether paper pulp can serve as a sustainable replacement for petrochemical foam. Assistant Professor JT Bachman’s course Processing the Anthropocene and his broader research initiative Waste Not, Want Not engage students to explore how waste materials—ranging from plastic collected across Grounds to stone off-cuts from local fabricators—can be transformed into durable objects and building material prototypes. Together, these efforts represent just a few of the initiatives underway at the A-School that demonstrate how abundant, untapped waste resources are energizing a collective commitment to exploring sustainable material alternatives and practices. 

Leftovers builds on this momentum, transforming the concept of “leftovers” into a catalyst for innovation, collaboration, and community-building. 

Throughout spring 2026, Leftovers will activate Campbell Hall with creative, educational, and interdisciplinary programming that demonstrates the power of material and spatial reuse—from plastic waste to paper pulp and from repurposed sites to adaptive reuse—and beyond. Designed for students across the School of Architecture and UVA, the series fosters experimentation, joy, and a shared investment in imagining sustainable futures. 

Major components of the series include: 

Yuko Nishikawa: Seamless Paper to Installations 

Exhibition — Feb 20–Mar 13, 2026, Corner Gallery  
Paper to Sculpture to Paper Workshop — Feb 20, 2026, 12 pm, Van Lengen Lobby 

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This exhibition recreates artist Yuko Nishikawa’s Brooklyn studio, where she transforms waste seamless paper— thick, non-reflective matte paper used as backgrounds for photography, videography, and displays—into pulp and then a clay-like sculpting material. Over time, her studio has shifted from a ceramics workspace to an installation laboratory, with overhead cables suspending sculptural studies and mockups as she experiments with texture, color, form, and scale. 

Photographic panels will envelop the Corner Gallery, installed with suspended mobiles. On the central work table, visitors will find paper-processing tools, wire-forming equipment, and tactile paper-clay assemblies that students are encouraged to touch and explore. 

A complementary workshop, Paper to Sculpture to Paper, introduces students to Nishikawa’s material processes. She will discuss why she works with paper, demonstrate pulping methods, and guide participants in forming their own paper clay sculptures. 

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Yuko Nishikawa's studio in Brooklyn, NY. Photos courtesy the artist.

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Upcycled Sketchbook Making with The Scrappy Elephant 

Workshop — Mar 20, 2026, 10 am, Van Lengen Lobby 

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The Scrappy Elephant, a Charlottesville creative reuse center, specializes in reclaiming materials donated by local businesses and community members. In this workshop, UVA alumna and Scrappy Elephant instructor Rebecca Belt will guide students through crafting sketchbooks from upcycled paper while introducing foundational bookbinding techniques. The session highlights the creative and functional possibilities of giving discarded paper and cardboard new life.

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MVRDV: Carbon Confessions 

Exhibition — Mar 23–Apr 26, 2026, Elmaleh Gallery
Virtual Lecture + Discussion — Date to be announced

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Internationally recognized for its in-house Climate Team, the award-winning global architecture firm MVRDV brings Carbon Confessions to Campbell Hall—an exhibition offering insight into the “ideas, ideals and everyday actions—and yes, the missteps and missed opportunities” of their quest for carbon reductions. MVRDV has been a leader in what they call the “building construction revolution,” addressing the call to rethink the way buildings are designed and developed to reduce carbon emissions, consider sustainable alternatives, and address building life cycles. Members of MVRDV will lead a virtual discussion with students and faculty later this spring (date to be determined) to share important case studies and introduce CarbonSpace, a free web-based tool that helps architects design with embodied carbon from day one of the design process. 

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The Carbon Confessions exhibition includes a carousel of panels that provides 22 anecdotes of "how to push for low-carbon projects works in practice" accompanied by 12 "carbon cases" showing calculations of the embodied carbon of MVRDV projects using the software CarbonScape.

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A-School Showcase + Graduate Open House 

Mar 23, 2026, Campbell Hall 

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Anchoring the spring series is a school-wide celebration featuring demonstrations, exhibitions, and presentations of faculty- and student-led research. The event coincides with the release of the student-produced design research journal LUNCH Issue 19—also titled Leftovers—which invited contributors to broadly address the byproducts of design systems.

The showcase brings together current students, faculty, staff, and prospective graduate students to explore emerging directions in sustainable and ecologically-minded design. The showcase will highlight the creativity, rigor, and collaborative spirit that define these approaches across the A-School. 

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A Documentary Short 

Premiere Screening — Mar 23, 2026, Campbell 153 

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A professionally produced short film will debut during the A-School Showcase, highlighting students’ perspectives and collaborations with faculty on transforming a wide range of discarded materials into new functional and aesthetic forms. By circulating on the A-School's media platforms, the documentary will extend the impact of Leftovers beyond the semester, sharing the School’s commitment to sustainable material innovation with wider audiences. 

With generous support from the UVA Arts Council, Leftovers: Rethinking Waste in Design will advance sustainable creative practices and amplify the A-School’s leadership in ethical material innovation and thoughtful design practices. The spring 2026 series welcomes the A-School and UVA community to reimagine the role of leftovers—not as waste, but as possibility. 

More details about Leftovers will be shared on the School’s website in January 2026, coinciding with the announcement of the spring public programs and exhibition season.