Rohit Dsouza
Academic Portfolio
University of Southern California Bachelor of Architecture 2025
Rohit Dsouza
Los Angeles, CA | (720) 589-7278 | rs_127@usc.edu | Academic Portfolio
EDUCATION
University of Southern California
Bachelor of Architecture, Minor in Themed Entertainment
Dean’s List Recipient (2020 - 2025), Cum Laude
La Universidad Nacional Autonomá de Mexico, USC Architecture LTAM Study Abroad
RELEVANT SKILLS
GPA: 3.52
Gradated: May 2025
Spring 2024
Software: Rhinoceros, AutoCAD, Revit, Adobe Creative Suite (Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign, Premiere), Procreate
Tactical: Academic Drawing and Painting, Plein-Air Sketching, Model-Making, Fashion Illustration, Embroidery and Sewing
Miscellaneous: Strong Verbal and Written Communication, Leadership and Collaboration, Research
WORK/VOLUNTEER EXPERIENCE
Architectural Intern, Solid Space Design (Los Angeles, CA)
- Design intern at custom residential firm
- Worked as draftsman for specific client project, attended client meetings, presented incremental changes and research to clients
- Visit current construction sites, take accurate site measurements and applied to working 3D models
Resident Set Designer, “The Suspenders” (Los Angeles, CA)
- Design and build sets for USC’s premiere sketch comedy troupe, “The Suspenders”
- Manage and contribute to a “set building team” comprised of students
Spread Designer, Haute Magazine (Los Angeles, CA)
- Spread designer for campus-based fashion, art, and culture publication
- Design and create merchandize for magazine (clothing, stickers, pins, etc.)
Camp Organizer and Lead Counselor, Legend NAHS Arts Camp (Parker, CO)
- Organize a two-week arts camp for elementary-aged children, create lesson plans covering several art medias
- Directed other counselors and led majority of instructions sessions
Exhibit Curator and Communication Liaison, University of Denver (Denver, CO)
- Partnered with the University of Denver to create an intergenerational photo exhibit dealing with the importance of family picture albums as history.
- Led communication between multiple parties in order to present exhibit
ADDITIONAL EDUCATION OPPORTUNITIES
USC Architecture “LTAM” Study Abroad, University of Southern California (Los Angeles, CA)
- Inaugural class of USC Architecture’s Latin America study abroad program
- Studied throughout Cuba, Mexico (Mexico City and Oaxaca extensively), and Costa Rica
- Substantial urban research project about El Pedregal, Barragan’s first urban plan in CDMX
- Design charette with Universidad Nacional Autonomá de Mexico (UNAM); worked together with UNAM students to design an exhibition space
- Documented architectural sites through plentiful urban sketching
USC Exploration of Architecture, University of Southern California (Los Angeles, CA)
- Two-week pre-college program on tactical and architectural design
- Studied development of the design process as well as hands-on model-making and drafting
AWARDS AND HONORS
Degree Project Award Finalist, USC School of Architecture
Senior Art Student of the Year, Legend High School
Douglas County Art Honoree, Douglas County School District
AP Scholar w/ Distinction, National College Board
(Summer 2023, 2024)
(Jan. ‘22 - May ‘25 )
(Aug. ‘22 - May ‘25)
(Summer 2018, 2019)
(December 2018)
(Spring 2024)
(Summer 2019)
Colorado ACT Merit Scholarship, Colorado ACT (2025) (2020) (2018, 2019, 2020) (2018, 2019, 2020) (Fall 2019)
Table of Contents
Excerpts
The Canopy Museum
Art and film museum in Chinatown.
Jewel of S. Broadway
Adaptive re-use community center on a Downtown rooftop.
S. Central Co-Operative
Affordable housing (co-operative living) in South Central LA.
Ribbon Park
Sculptural park pier on Santa Monica Beach. Additional Works Artwork,
Work Experience
Selected professional work at Michael Maltzan Architecture for the Toledo Museum of Art.
Toledo Museum of Art
Michael Maltzan Architecture
Location: Toledo, Ohio
Work Duration: November 2025 - June 2026
Role: Architectural Design Staff
The Toledo Museum of Art is a mid-sized art museum undergoing a comprehensive exhibition design overhaul in an effort to chronologize and revitalize the many permanent galleries housing artwork dating from classic to contemporary and hailing from all corners of the globe.
Working as part of a collaborative design team, I developed and maintained Rhino models of the Museum and produced Enscape visualisations for client-presentations and public facing media. I also created and updated a navigable panorama set (similar to Matterport) of all Museum galleries for easy access to clients.
Moreover, I modeled multiple exhibition design iterations for galleries large and small and for specialized galleries housing classic Mediterranean art, decorative glass, ancient coins, and the Museum’s own history. I also assisted in the production of Revit documentation and worked on largescale physical models for client worksessions.
Gallery 23A-2: A gallery of East Asian Art
4 Herrick Lobby: Rendering of the new museum lobby
Gallery 24: A gallery of French impressionist work from 1700 to 1800
Gallery 6: A gallery of religious work from the 6th to 10th century
Academic Work
Selected design work from my studios at the University of Southern California.
The Canopy Museum
ARCH 500 | Fall 2024
Location: Chinatown, Los Angeles, California
Project Type: Art and Film Museum
Professor: Alejandra Lillo
Located in LA’s historic Chinatown, the Canopy Museum aims to connect a community underserved by public art access with underexposed professional artists -- particularly Black and brown creatives.
A spiritual successor to the former Underground Museum, this project aims to promote arts enrichment through free public art education, an arts library, a museum cafe, access to film and traditional art galleries, film screenings, and cultural events.
These programs will be interweaved to promote connection between working artists and their surrounding community and will be collected under one continuous blanketed roof. This effect is achieved through the use of PTFE membrane panels attached to a series of curved CLT vaults -- these vaults act as the primary structural grid, going literally from floor to ceiling.
To further promote this feeling of interconnectedness, all programs are access through a central circulation core. A counter-clockwise path is utilized in all spaces in order to continue this idea.
Perimetered with clerestory glazing, the museum privileges the use of ambient natural light in all spaces, while the canopy overhansgs offer shading to the upper floors that contain traditional art pieces in need of sensitive lighting conditions.
Overall, the Canopy Museum proposes the idea of a cultural connector; a device that not only brings work to an art desert, but also interstitches the creative innovators of today with the blooming artists of tomorrow.
Initial Concept Diagram
The programattic sheme of the Canopy Museum aims to highlight its public-serving areas (the main lobby, galleries, library, cafe, and classrooms) by exposing them to the building’s perimeter and in turn its clerestory glazing. This main program is bound together by a large central staircase that is used as the circulatory vehicle throught the project.
Thse programs are subsequently placed in a stepped pattern in order to privilege a continuous blanketed ceiling condition, that both physically and spiritually houses all aspects of the program under the same roof. In certain programs (the cafe, for example) each program will be directly visible, whereas in others the connective aspect is merely implied.
The auxiliary program (various storages, labs, and workshops) are sandwiched underneath these areas. The majority of these spaces need dilligent lighting and cooling control and are thus not exposed to the ample light generated from the perimeter glass (though the circulatory corridor outlining these programs on the ground and second floor is exposed).
The administrative wing acts as a hinge, tucked a way from the more exuberant program. While these two floors are more dilligently parsed than the public-facing areas, they still share the privilege of beatufiul natural light.
Structural Chunk
Interior Perspective
Exterior Perpective
Sculpture Gallery
The Jewel of S. Broadway
ARCH
302b | Spring 2023
Location: Downtown, Los Angeles, California
Project Type: Community Center (Adaptive Re-Use)
Professor: John Mutlow
Situated in the once buzzling entertainment hub of DTLA, the Jewel of South Broadway aims to aid in the movement to restore the street to its former glory. Broadway, once a haven of theatre, nightlife, and dining, now lays as a psuedo-dead zone masked by historical facades. Joint with the established effort of revitalizing the area for the 2028 LA Olympics, I aimed to create a center that brought arts and culture to the area through community engagement.
The Jewel of South Broadway, uses the existing roof of the former May Company Department Store (pictured, at present, below). Consisting of a large educational ceramics and painting studio, a central sculpture garden, events spaces, a library, and blackbox theatre, the center aims to attract community members at daytime and nigtime, to stay for a little while or the majority of their day, and to hopefully encourage more foot traffic in the district.
The views of surrounding Downtown Los Angeles offer an expeience unrivaled by anything else in this vast city.
Existing Site: 801 S, Broadway
The former May Company Buidling was a flagship department store and a major commercenter for DTLA. It now lays unused and vacant behind a 20th century imitation Beaux-Arts facade.
Initial Program Sketches
Concept Collage
The first challenge of this brief was to leave the existing facade of the former building practically untouched, as Broadway adheres to a strict historical aesthetic code. This led to the occupation of the roof. When thinking of program, I thought of why a community would want to come to an arts center at all times of day, I payed special attention to nighttime due to the districts former stardom as a nightlife hub. I explore the simple idea of “Art on the Roof: from Day to Night” in the top collage.
I organized my program through the dichotomy of a landscape painting: 1. the subject (a.k.a the jewel) was the main daytime arts educational complex that contained the ceramic and painting studio, a kyln, and a large upper balcony for views, 2. the midground, the scultpure garden and playground that acted as a connector for all programs, and 3. the background, the theatre, offices, library, and events spaces that would only be occupied during specific times of day -- these programs are tucked into the existing context already occupying the May Company Building roof.
Sculpture Courtyard
“Jewel” Workshop Lobby Threshold
Structural Chunk and Wall Section
“Jewel” Structural System
Lateral Section
Longitudinal Section
Ribbon Park
ARCH 402a (Charette) | Fall 2023
Location: Santa Monica, Los Angeles, California
Project Type: Pier, Sculpture Park
Professor: Dora Chi
Located off the coast of Santa Monica Beach, almost exactly halfway between Santa Monica and Venice Fishing Pier, Ribbon Park serves as a recreational getaway -- an urban activator that promotes local residents to not only get out to the beach but venture further into views of the ocean.
Largely inspired by Heatherwick’s Little Island project in Manhattan, Ribbon Park is a meandering sculpture garden -- a series of follies complimented by the beautiful backdrop of the Pacific Ocean.
A response to a specific two-week charrete prompt, I begin my design exploration through a series of “quick and dirty” models made of foam core, bristal paper and wooden sticks and dowels. I then explored through sketch, first putting tracing paper to my models to outline program and focal points, then eventually idesating through digital sketches. I kept coming back towards a ribbonesque, squid-like park leading the vistor to the middle of the ocean before ciruclating around in tendrils.
From afar I saw it rising from the sea, revealing itself as a vistor came closer and closer to the beach, and enticing and alluring urban activator.
Ultimately, I felt this was a project of passion that I hope translates to an enigmatic sense of intrigue to a visitor passing by. While the program may be loose and free-flowing, I hope that is precisely this bit of non-specificity that would inspire an audience; one that would inspire a passervy to fill any gaps with their own dreams and creativity.
Initial Concept Diagram
Final Gestural Plan
Park Exterior Perspective
Park Exterior Perspective
Additional Work
parallel practices in graphic design, magazine spread design, plein-air sketching, and more!
Work for Haute Magazine Stickers,
Merchandise Mockups, and Designed Spreads.
Pictured here are a few excerpts of work I did for Haute Magazine, USC’s premiere arts, fashion, and culture on-campus publication. Each semester we would pick a theme and release a 200/300 page compendium exploring said theme through photography, styling, and graphic design. Issue themes during my time with Haute included “Hyperreality”, “In Plain Sight”, “Limbo”, “Philia”, “Winds of Change”, and “Transcendence.”
I worked as a spread and graphic designer in the visual design team for two years (Fall 2022 - Spring 2023 and Fall 2023 - Spring 2024) and then worked as the supervising visual director my senior year (Fall 2024 - Spring 2025). My role as a spread and graphic designer was to create magazine spreads with provided assets that adhered to a house style with specific graphic codes whilst communicating the thematic elements of the spread. Sometimes this included creating illustrations for pieces of writing (mostly poems and short stories) and creating mockups of merchandise and designs for club stickers that were sold at our laungh party.
As a visual director I had direct influence of the themes tackled in each semester’s issue. This included picking an overarching theme, creating suggested subtopics, creating a moodboard with applicable references for our photography and visual design teams to utilize, pitching my team to the rest of the leadership to then be clarified and narrowed down to pitch to our entire club (around sixty members). I would then supervise and provide critique for all designs -- spread or otherwise -- made by our visual design team (a group of fourteen). My final responsibility was to edit, compile, and publish all design spreads. Because the visual design team created the final product of the magazine a lot of time was spent editing and re-editing, adjusting and moving on a tight turn around for launch.
Below are a handful of examples of the littany of work that I did for Haute, I find that these designs and spreads are most representative of the cross section of me as an artist with Haute’s design identity.
1
2 3
Merchandise mockups for Haute Magazine’s “In Plain Sight” issue inspired by the work of Norman Rockwell and J.C. Leyendecker.
Sticker designs for Haute Magazine’s “Hyperreality” issue referencing the extents of subcultures (emo, goth, ballroom, drag, etc.) in combination with the work of Hajime Sorayama.
Sticker designs for Haute Magazine’s “Limbo“ issue that explore the extents between heaven and hell. References include Franz Szony, Mugler, Starlet, American Horror Story, and more.
A spread design for the “Limbo” issue entitled “Grace in the Abyss”.
A spread design for the “In Plain Sight” issue eponymously titled after the displayed photographer, Ted Min.
Travel Sketch Excerpts
Latin America Study Abroad (Spring 2024 Cuba, Mexico, and Costa Rica)
Havana, Cuba: a quick sketch from the roof of my professor’s hotel in Havana Vieja. This was done on day one or two of our travels.
de Mexico, Mexico: a depiction of a Mayan head sculpture from el Museo Nacional de Anthropologia. Part of a larger exhibit on the traditions and evolution of Mayan artisanal work.
Oaxaca, Mexico: sketch notes from two separate site visits in Oaxaca. The top left are quick interpretations of la Biblioteca Infantil, a children’s library conceptualized by famous Oaxacan artist Francisco Toledo. The sketches on the right depict Monte Alban, a ruin just outside of Oaxaca Centro that was inhabited by the Olmec, Zapotec, and Mixtec at different periods.
Alzompa, Mexico: a sketch done during the lunch break of our day trip to Alzompa a town outside of Oaxaca city known for its crafts. This cathedral neighbored the main open market of the town, and was closed due to structureal refittings.
Havana, Cuba: the first sketch of my trip; The view from the window in our Casa Particular in the heart of Havana Vieja. It is of a neighbor’s balcony. I was particularly interested in the details of the wrought iron used for the railing.
Oaxaca, Mexico: a cactus growing on the site of Monte Alban. There are some great photos of me parked right in front of this cactus in a huge white cowboy hat that I bought at the site because the sun was so intense.
San Jose, Costa Rica: a group of sketches from exploring around San Jose. The first is a sketch of a statue inside the Teatro Nacional, the second is a section of an installation outside the Museo Nacional
Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico: my favorite of a series of quick contour sketches done in el Centro de Ciudad de Mexico. This is a detail from the main Cathedral flanking the plaza.
Ciudad de Mexico, Mexico: a depiction of a detail from a Mayan structure inside el Museo Nacional de Anthropologia. 1 2 3 4
Ciudad
Mexico: A drawing of the primary facade of el Centro de Artes de San Augustin (CASA). Originally a textile factory, the complex has now been turned into a center for artists.
An
A
of the
of Templo
Oaxaca, Mexico: A facade elevation of a coffee shop in the Xochimilco neighborhood in Oaxaca City.
Oaxaca, Mexico: a sketch of an excerpt of a painting inside el Centro Cutrual de Oaxaca.
Oaxaca, Mexico: A perspective sketch of the interior of el Centro Cultural de Oaxaca, an anthropolgy and art museum that flanks el plaza mayor de Oaxaca. I was infatuated with this central fountain.
Oaxaca, Mexico: Sketches of the native plants adorned throughout el Jardine Ethnobotanico de Oaxaca (the botanical garden in Oaxaca city). These were drawn while we took a guided tour.
Tlaxcala, Mexico: An ornate podium from the interior of a cathedral from our second visit to the town of Tlaxcala.
Tikuch, Mexico: Sketch notes of the cathedral in the town of Tikuch. Located between Tulum and the site of Chichen Itza, Tikuch is unique in that it is largely comprise of indigenous Mayans.
Oaxaca,
Oaxaca, Mexico:
elevation
Santo Domingo de Guzman, a cathedral flanking a major plaza in Oaxaca.
Oaxaca, Mexico:
sketch
Oaxacan bean plant. Oaxaca actually gets its name from this bean plant. This specific sketch was done in the Oaxaca botanical gardens.
Thank You!
email: rohitcdsouza@gmail.com
phone: (720) 589-7278
instagram: @dsouzarch