New Essentialism: Material Architecture examines how architecture engages material to create effect through five critical historical thresholds represented by analytical precedents coupled with projective experimental design project families. Unpacking the fundamental methodologies of their geometric, material, spatial, and effectual sensibilities, each threshold builds an examination that reveals the essential methods and processes of design, illustrating the basis for the argument for a New Essentialism: its characteristics, methods and the sensibilities that mark its definition. AUTHOR: Gail Peter Borden, FAIA is principal of Borden Partnership and Professor and Director of Graduate Programs at the University of Houston Gerald D. Hines College of Architecture and Design. His work focuses on the role of materiality in architecture. SELLING POINT: Illustrates the basis of the argument for a New Essentialism, through an examination of how architecture engages materials to effect 400 colour images