Photo Courtesy Taeho Kim
Joseph Akira Fujinami (藤浪旦), Assoc. AIA, is a Japanese-American architect and designer based in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Fujinami graduated with honors from the Illinois Institute of Technology (B.ARCH 2021) in Chicago and has pursued an exchange at the Architectural Association (AA) in London. In 2016, The U.S. Department of Education and The White House Commission on Presidential Scholars named Fujinami a U.S. Presidential Scholar with a distinction in the inaugural Career Technical Education class for his early pursuits in the subject of Design Technology. Born in Honolulu, Hawaii, Fujinami graduated from high school as class valedictorian to later pursue architecture - an endeavor to combine his love for engineering and artful expression in music.
Fujinami began his first internship with Chicago Transit Authority's department in Facilities Maintenance Engineering. In the year following, Fujinami joined renowned Chicago-based firm Studio Gang, where he worked alongside Time's Most Influential Architect, Jeanne Gang on the University of Chicago Center in Paris, the office's first project in France. At BIG - Bjarke Ingels Group in Copenhagen, Fujinami extended his portfolio in Paris as well as in Prague, Czech Republic during his year-long internship.
In the spring of 2019, Fujinami was awarded a prestigious grant to study with Lord Norman Foster and MIT Media Lab founder, Nicholas Negroponte in a workshop on informal settlements at the Norman Foster Foundation in Madrid. Later the same year, Fujinami intensified his interests on the subject of urban renewal through a semester exchange at London's Architectural Association where he studied beneath Marie Monseignat and Ekaterina Larina. He received the school's highest distinction for his project regenerating western Athens.
Following work with Skidmore, Owings and Merrill (SOM) in New York City, Fujinami is currently a Master of Architecture degree candidate at Harvard University (M.ARCH II 2026) and recipient of the Dean's Merit Scholarship.