Katie MacDonald

Katie MacDonald is assistant professor of architecture at the University of Virginia School of Architecture, cofounder of After Architecture, and director of the Before Building Laboratory. She is also codirector of the Hemp CoLab at UVA. MacDonald’s scholarship reconsiders construction standards and materials in light of new life cycle questions and overextended supply chains. She pioneers new biomaterial assemblies, with the aim of creating systems of building materials that sequester carbon and reduce construction’s contribution to the environmental crisis. 

MacDonald also creates venues for scholarly exchange and public engagement by co-curating, convening, and raising funds for symposia like the Biomaterial Building Exposition, which placed installations highlighting multiple novel approaches to biomaterial construction in dialogue and on public view at UVA.