Jeanne Gang… An American architect based in Chicago and New York. Who grew up looking up to Lina Bo Bardi, And yes… We know, she actually does not like talking about this fact, but it is a big one: she directs one of the best female-led architecture firms in the world, Studio Gang… But… How much do YOU really know about her? Let’s put your knowledge to the TEST.

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For a bit of an introduction… Gang was raised in Belvidere, IL and earned her Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University of Illinois in 1986 and a Master of Architecture with Distinction from the Harvard Graduate School of Design in 1993. In 1989, she was an International Rotary Fellow, and she studied at the ETH Swiss Federal University of Technical Studies in Zurich, Switzerland. Jeanne is a distinguished alumna of the Harvard Graduate School of Design, where she was recently appointed Professor in Practice. She lectures frequently throughout the world and serves on various civic and design-focused committees and advisory groups. Asides from teaching though, she worked with a very recognized architect today…

Who did Gang work with after studying?

A) Rem Koolhaas
B) Peter Eisenmann
C) Peter Zumthor

A) Rem Koolhaas

A 2011 MacArthur Fellow, Gang and her Studio were awarded the 2013 National Design Award for Architecture from the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. Gang was named the 2016 Woman Architect of the Year by the Architectural Review. In 2017, she was honored with the Louis I. Kahn Memorial Award (Philadelphia Center for Architecture) and Fellowship in the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada and was also elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2018, she was elected an International Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), a lifetime honor.

Her diverse body of work spans scales and typologies, expanding beyond architecture’s conventional boundaries to pursuits ranging from the development of stronger materials to fostering stronger communities.

Jeanne is internationally renowned for a design process that foregrounds the relationships between….

A) individuals
B) communities
C) environments
D) All of the above

D) All of the above

Community advocacy, sustainability, environmentalism, interdisciplinary collaboration — these may sound like buzz words better suited to a 1970s political activist than a leading 21st-century architecture firm, but they are all essential elements in the practice. The firm embodies ideals that may seem counter to market logic; but post-economic meltdown, they represent a smart model for how a contemporary firm can make stylish, daring work without compromising either its politics or its clients’ pocket books. Over the last few years Gang and her team have been on a roll with a number of groundbreaking projects…. (Interview by PINUP Magazine)

What project is known as “the tallest skyscraper ever designed by a female-led team"?

A) Aqua Tower
B) City Hyde Park
C) Gardens in the Machine

A) Aqua Tower

Aqua’s success has led to other buildings by the firm that employ what’s been dubbed “inhabitable facades,” where balconies provide opportunities for connection without compromising privacy. In this alternative way of thinking, architecture and urban planning are potential antidotes to the fragmented and isolating city.

“Instead of thinking of architecture as limited to a site plot line,” she says, “let’s see how architecture can connect to larger ecosystems and cultural communities. Let’s see how architecture can be the spark for much bigger change.”

At 82 stories, reaching a height of 876 feet, Aqua Tower is one of few tall buildings to create a community on its facade. Combining a hotel, offices, rental apartments, condominiums, and parking, along with one of Chicago’s largest green roofs, Aqua facilitates strong connections between people and to the city. The design for Aqua uses architecture to capture and reinterpret the human and outdoor connections that occur more naturally when living closer to the ground. Its distinctive form is achieved by varying the floor slabs across the height the tower, based on criteria such as views, sunlight, and use.

Strategically sculpting the shape of each floor slab offers comfortable outdoor terraces, where neighbors can casually and comfortably interact when desired, as well as views to Chicago landmarks, navigating sight lines around the corners and through the gaps between existing buildings. The overall design is the cumulative result of responses to specific conditions of density, environment, and use.

How does Jeanne Gang NOT get inspiration?

A) experiencing the city
B) creating a reading list
C) printing Pinterest pictures

C) Printing Pinterest pictures

One way I get started [on a project] is usually by creating a reading list of research around a topic that we might be dealing with. That reading list is added to by people that are participating in the project, including the client. That reading list builds up and it is a thing that creates a common baseline knowledge about the subject matter. So many times, inspiration comes from just reading about a subject and where the mind starts to take you. It starts getting more and more exciting the more that you build up that knowledge base.

The other kind of inspiration comes when you are not really trying, and you are just experiencing the city or something in nature; it is from direct observation of the world around you. A lot of times, for me, it is the natural world or a phenomena that I come into contact with—whether it is a storm or some kind of biological occurrence or animal or nature or something in a museum—those kind of things. Those terrestrial things are oftentimes very important and interesting to me.

Definitely, there are people that inspire me. Many times it is in these allied, but different professions or fields when I can suddenly make connections and synthesize information about my own knowledge or what we are doing at the studio with something that might be happening in the sciences or in urban planning or even in policy. Those are where the exciting synapses happen with me. And making sure that you have opportunities to be exposed to those different things. I love going to listen to architects, but I especially like to go outside the field and see what is going on, especially in the arts and in science. (On an interview with NEA ARTS MAGAZINE)

Jeanne Gang is definitely a very successful designer and thinker… Can you guess where she appeared this year?

A) TIME Person of the Year
B) Forbes 400
C) TIME 100 Most Influential People

C) TIME 100 Most Influential People

Most recently, she was named to the TIME 100 most influential people of 2019. Widely published and acclaimed, her work has been exhibited at the Venice Architecture Biennale, Chicago Architecture Biennial, Museum of Modern Art, and Art Institute of Chicago. She is the author of Reveal, the first volume on Studio Gang’s work and process, and Reverse Effect: Renewing Chicago’s Waterways, which envisions a radically greener future for the Chicago River.

Most importantly though, Gang is interested in how the city functions. She envisions buildings where neighbors take the time to talk to one another, and cities where inhabitants value unhurried walks along waterfronts as much as they do quick drives on highways. She also imagines these purposefully engaged communities to include birds and insects. In fact, Gang considers the health of human life to be contingent on the health of natural ecological systems, particularly in cities. Healthy ecology is a really important part of making cities more livable.

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