celebrating women in architecture
March is Women’s History month, and International Women’s Day was earlier this week, so we wanted to celebrate by diving deep into the history of women in architecture! We are going to share some short histories with you, but the influence of these women goes way beyond what we can share with you in one day. It is because of women like these that we are able to do what we love today, because they paved the way generations of women to come!
sophia hayden bennett 1868-1953
Sophia graduated as the first woman to receive and architecture degree from MIT in 1890. The Woman’s Building at the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1892 was her best known work, and she designed this building when she was only 21 years old. For her work on the project, Sophia was paid $1,000 while a man at the time would have been paid about $10,000 for completing a project of the same scale. About a year or two later, almost all of the buildings from this fair were destroyed. Frustrated with the way she had been treated so early on in her career, Sophia did not work as an architect again. Instead, she married artist William Blackstone Bennett and they both worked as artists together while living a quiet life in Massachusetts until her death in 1953.
jane drew 1911-1996
In 1929 Jane Drew graduated from the Architectural Association School in London, and went on to be a part of the Modern Architectural Research Group that applied Le Corbusier’s concepts of the Modern Movement. Jane Drew left the first firm that she worked for to open her own architectural practice that was for women only in order to give them opportunities that were harder to come by for women at the time. Sadly, World War II put a hold on Jane’s plans but she persisted. Jane and her husband Maxwell Fry joined Le Corbusier’s team in the 1950’s to build the Indian city of Chandigarh, which was their best known project. Jane Drew was also an amazing writer and was the first woman to get tenure as a professor at Harvard and MIT in the 1980’s. She was also the first woman to preside over the Architectural Association.
"I practiced architecture in a time full of hope and optimism. At a time when we felt that the changes in architecture and urban planning that we proposed would transform living conditions and improve the world. In a time of great hope for the future.” -Jane Drew
norma merrick sklarek 1926-2012
Norma Merrick Sklarek was born in 1926 in Harlem, New York and was the only child of her parents who both immigrated from Trinidad. Norma attended Barnard College for one year, and then went to study at the School of Architecture at Columbia University and graduated in 1950 as one of the two women in her class, and the only African American in her class. Norma faced a lot of discrimination when she was first looking for a job, and applied to and got rejected by nineteen different firms. In 1954 she took the architecture licensing examination, passed it on her first try, and became the first licensed African American woman architect in New York. Norma took a job at Gruen Associates in 1960 where she stayed for about 20 years, and worked her way up to being the director of architecture. In 1985 she cofounded Siegel Sklarek Diamond which at the time was the largest women-owned architectural firm in the United States.
“Architecture should be working on improving the environment of people in their homes, in their places of work, and their places of recreation. It should be functional and pleasant, not just in the image of the architect's ego.” -Norma Merrick Sklarek
zaha hadid 1950-2016
Zaha Hadid was born in Baghdad, Iraq during a time of growth so as a child she was able to see the completion of new buildings designed by icons such as Frank Lloyd Wright and Le Corbusier. During her childhood, Zaha’s family traveled a lot and she received an international education. Zaha Hadid attended the American University in Beirut, Lebanon where she earned a degree in mathematics, and then went on to study at the Architectural Association in London where she graduated in 1977. In 1980 she formed Zaha Hadid Architects which was her own firm based in London. She also taught architecture at the Architectural Association, Harvard Graduate School of Design, Cambridge University, and Columbia University. Zaha Hadid is known as one of the most influential architects of her time, and she has designed so many iconic buildings from residential spaces to stadiums. Her designs are so unique and often associated with Deconstructivism, which is a style that emerged in the 1980s and embodies sculptural shapes with dramatic angles and curves.
“Of course I believe imaginative architecture can make a difference to people’s lives, but I wish it was possible to divert some of the effort we put into ambitious museums and galleries into the basic architectural building blocks of society.” -Zaha Hadid