New Essentialism: Material Architecture examines how architecture engages material to create effect. It approaches this complex topic through five critical historical thresholds, represented by analytical precedents and coupled with projective experimental design projects. 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. In turn, this illustrates the basis of the argument for a New Essentialism: its characteristics, methods and the sensibilities that mark its definition.