Firm — Dirk Denison Architects

firm.

who we are.

Dirk Denison Architects is a Chicago-based firm recognized internationally for award-winning design that reflects the uniqueness of each client’s needs to live, work, learn, and create. With over 30 years of experience, we have developed an experience-driven process that crafts a narrative specific to each project. Considerations of legacy, sustainability, and preservation are often present in our work, further enriching the conversation.

services.

We offer a wholistic approach with a full range of services including master planning, programming, site analysis, design, preparation and administration of construction documents, and post-construction services, as well as interior furnishing, furniture design, and art consulting.

approach.

DDA crafts a narrative for each of our projects—one that weaves together the idiosyncrasies of the site, program, and client. Our process centers around care and consideration, space and design, quality and craft, materiality and landscape. We are critical in the selection, sourcing, and arrangement of materiality and technologies in every project, understanding the impact every decision makes to a project’s performance. Combined, the result elicits surprise, revelation, information, poetry, and seduction, while fulfilling the basic human desire to shape one’s surroundings.

portfolio.

Our work throughout the U.S. has been recognized by international design publications, including Architect, Architectural Digest, A+U, Elle Décor, Global Architecture, Interior Design, Interior Design Homes, Metropolitan Home, The New York Times Magazine, Progressive Architecture, and the Urban Land Institute Magazine, and has won awards from the American Institute of Architects, AIA Chicago, the Chicago Architectural Club, and IIDA Illinois, along with the Gold Key Award for Excellence in Hospitality Design.

dirk denison.

Dirk Denison, FAIA, is an architect, educator, and dedicated supporter of the arts. He trained at the University of Michigan, Illinois Institute of Technology, and Harvard’s Graduate School of Design. Denison has been a full-time faculty member at IIT for over thirty years and serves as the Director of the Mies Crown Hall Americas Prize (MCHAP). His first monograph, Dirk Denison 10 Houses, was published by Actar in December 2018.

team.

As a nimble office working at various scales and complexities, all members of the team are involved and supported to participate in all aspects of a project. Our singular goal, to always exceed client expectations, is facilitated by our ability to work in a collaborative structure making the most of our team’s diverse backgrounds, experiences, and knowledge bases.