News
Andrew Atwood gives a lecture, “Buildings and Casework,” at UC Berkeley in 112 Bauer Wurster Hall at 6pm on October 8, 2025,
Anna Neimark publishes an essay, titled “VA Building 701 MacArthur: A Postwar Machine,” in Log 64: Toward a Newer Brutalism or the Undecorated Shed, guest edited by Emmett Zeifman in Summer 2025.
Andrew Atwood is distinguished with the Doris and Clarence Malo Collegium Teaching Chair in Design at the Department of Architecture in the College of Environmental Design at UC Berkeley.
Anna Neimark responds to the work of Pablo Garcia Luna in a dialog, “A Permeable Atlas,” concluding his SOM Foundation Residency at the MAK Center for Art and Architecture at the Schindler House in Los Angeles at 6pm on August 6, 2025.
First Office exhibits two models, titled “Rock Paper Rock,” in the group show The Perimeter of Architecture: Amid the Elements, curated by Sylvia Lavin, in James Stirling’s Book Pavilion at the Venice Biennale from May 10 through November 23, 2025.
Anna Neimark participates in the SCI-Arc Graduate Thesis Symposium: Staging Ideas at the Venice Architecture Biennale together with Jacki Bloom, Matt Shaw, William Virgil, and Liam Young in Keck Hall at 2pm on July 16, 2025.
First Office exhibits two models, PS1 Dolmen and Encinitas ADU, against the background of several piezographic prints by the 19th century natural historian Eugène Trutat, at the Montana State University School of Architecture from March 3 through March 10, followed by a lecture, “Notes from the Design Trenches,” in Cheever Hall Room 215 at 5:30pm on March 10, 2025.
Shane Reiner-Roth reviews Green House (2025) in “First Office and Alex Robinson collaborate on a muted home addition in the Los Angeles hills,” in The Architect’s Newspaper on March 4, 2025.
First Office gives a lecture, “Beige, Grey, Green, and Rude,” at the University of Michigan Taubman College of Architecture & Urban Planning in the Auditorium Room 2104 at 6pm on February 3, 2025.
Site: Mr. Wren
First Office was founded in 2011 by Anna Neimark and Andrew Atwood to create a dialog between architectural practice and academic discourse. Their collaborative work spans buildings, exhibitions, and publications, all rooted in the belief that architecture is a form of cultural production.
The practice has engaged with leading institutions, including the MAK Center for Art and Architecture, the Chicago and Venice Biennials, MoMA PS1’s Young Architects Program, and the Architectural League of New York. The projects and essays of First Office have been recognized with awards and compiled in Nine Essays (Treatise Press, 2015), as well as in Andrew’s publication Not Interesting: On the Limits of Criticism in Architecture (Applied Research and Design, 2017).
Anna Neimark
Design Faculty and Visual Studies Coordinator, SCI-Arc
anna.neimark@gmail.com
Andrew Atwood
Licensed Architect and Associate Professor, UC Berkeley
w.andrew.atwood@gmail.com