Michael Manfredi

Architect / United States / WEISS/MANFREDI Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism

Michael Manfredi is co-founder of Weiss/Manfredi Architecture/Landscape/Urbanism, based in New York City. The multidisciplinary firm operates at the nexus of architecture, art, landscape, and urban design. The firm’s Olympic Sculpture Park exemplifies this cross-disciplinary design approach and the project has been recognized internationally through museum exhibitions and design awards. Time magazine identified the park as one of the top 10 projects in the world, Barcelona’s World Architecture Festival selected the project as winner in the Nature Category, I.D. magazine awarded it the highest Environmental Design Award, and it was the first project in North America to win Harvard University's Veronica Rudge Green Prize in Urban Design.

Weiss/Manfredi received the American Academy of Arts and Letters award, which acknowledged the distinct vision of the firm, and the firm was named one of North America's "Emerging Voices" by the Architectural League of New York. The firm was also honored with the New York AIA Gold Medal and the Tau Sigma Delta Gold Medal, annually awarded to one individual or firm in the world each year. The firm's projects have been featured in exhibitions at The Museum of Modem Art, the Venice Architectural Biennale, the São Paulo Biennale of International Architecture and Design, the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, the National Building Museum, Harvard University, the International Landscape Architecture Biennale in Barcelona, and the Design Centre in Essen, Germany. The firm’s first monograph, Site Specific and the more recent Weiss/Manfredi Surface/Subsurface were published by Princeton Architectural Press.

Weiss/Manfredi’s Visitor Center at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden recently opened to the public. Other built work includes the Diana Center, a multi-use arts building at Barnard College whose design won a national design competition and a Progressive Architecture Award, and establishes a new nexus for social, cultural, and intellectual life for both the campus and the city. The Diana Center also won the New York State AIA Best Building Award in 2010 as well as a National AIA Honor Award. Weiss/Manfredi recently won a national competition to redesign the Washington Monument Grounds at Sylvan Theater. Other current projects include two new buildings for Novartis North America’s headquarters; Hunter’s Point South Waterfront Park, located on the East River in Queens, New York; and the Krishna P. Singh Center for Nanotechnology at the University of Pennsylvania.

Michael Manfredi received his Master of Architecture at Cornell University where he studied with Colin Rowe. He won the Paris Prize, was a Cornell Fellow, and was awarded an Eidlitz Fellowship. He has taught design studios at Harvard University, Yale University, University of Pennsylvania, Princeton University, and the Institute for Architecture and Urban Studies. He is a founding board member of the Van Alen Institute, is currently a board member for the Storefront for Art and Architecture, and has been the Gensler Visiting Professor at Cornell University.

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