About Us

The Evelyn & Harold Hay Media Resource Center (MRC) collects,
maintains, and provides access to architecture and environmental design-related resources. The MRC's Collections include books,
periodicals, slide and digital images, working drawings, and material samples. These various resources strengthen the College of Architecture & Environmental Design's educational mission of offering textual, visual, and digital resources on architecture design, practice, and history; building technology; urban planning; and landscape architecture CAED's faculty and students.

The MRC was founded in 1967, principally as a book and slide library. Since then, it has expanded to include collections of building plans, educational DVDs, and 24,000 digital images. Most recently, during the 2007-08 academic year, the MRC was substantially renovated and augmented to include a Materials Sample Collection.

The MRC provides a comfortable environment for study, research and browsing. Our staff can help students and faculty navigate library databases, refine search terms, and suggest new search strategies. The individual assistance offered by the MRC staff aims to provide students with skilled information research techniques and formal analysis for the practice of architecture and the environmental design-related fields.

The MRC is generously supported by the  Evelyn and Harold Hay Fund.

About Harold Hay

Harold R. Hay is a Los Angeles area scientist, inventor and building materials expert who pioneered in the research of solar stills and roof ponds as natural air-conditioning. Hay donated his Atascadero 'skytherm' house to the College of Architecture and Environmental Design to further the study of passive solar technology. The gift includes the property and monetary support to establish a visiting professorship in the future and to fund a variety of student projects and faculty research, as well as an endowment for annual upkeep of the house. Much of Hay's research, including plans for the skytherm house are available in the Media Resource Center.

Additional information can be found at the Evelyn and Harold Hay Fund web site.