Joyce Hwang, FAIA, NOMA, NCARB

Professor, Director of Graduate Studies - Department of Architecture
jh96@buffalo.edu - 129 Crosby Hall - (716) 829-5906

Professor, Director of Graduate Studies - Department of Architecture- 129 Crosby Hall 

Hwang engaged in a freshman studio critique.

Joyce Hwang stands with “Habitat Wall,” a prototype wall structure that accommodates humans and urban animals such as bats, raccoons and birds. Says Hwang: "I am interested in exploring how a wall can act not only as a facade, but also as an inhabitable, living membrane." Photo by Scott Gable

Joyce Hwang is professor and director of graduate studies of Architecture at the University at Buffalo, State University of New York. She is the director of Ants of the Prairie, an office of architectural practice and research that focuses on confronting contemporary ecological conditions through creative means, and a partner in Double Happiness.

For nearly two decades, Hwang has been developing a series of projects that incorporate wildlife habitats into constructed environments. She is a recipient of the WOJR/Civitella Ranieri Architecture Prize Fellowship (2024), Exhibit Columbus University Research Design Fellowship (2020-21), the Architectural League Emerging Voices Award (2014), the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) Fellowship (2013), the New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) Independent Project Grant (2013, 2008), and the MacDowell Fellowship (2016, 2011).

Her work has been featured by the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), and exhibited at Brooklyn Botanic Garden, Matadero Madrid, the Venice Architecture Biennale, and the Rotterdam International Architecture Biennale, among other venues. Hwang’s projects and writing have been featured in publications including Architect Magazine, Architectural Record, Architectural Review, AV Proyectos, Azure Magazine, Biophilic Cities Journal, Bracket, Curbed, Elle Décor, Forbes, Good, Log, Metropolis Magazine, Next NaturePraxis, Volume Magazine, and World Architects. She is a co-organizer of the Hive City Habitat Design Competition and a co-editor of Beyond Patronage: Reconsidering Models of Practice, published by Actar. Hwang serves as a Core Organizer for Dark Matter University, and previously served on the editorial board for the Journal of Architectural Education (JAE).

Hwang is a registered architect in New York State, and has practiced professionally with offices in New York, Philadelphia, San Francisco, and Barcelona. She received a post-professional Master of Architecture degree from Princeton University and a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Cornell University, where she was awarded the Charles Goodwin Sands Memorial Bronze Medal.

"My work is dedicated to developing creative approaches in confronting the pleasures and horrors of our contemporary ecologies."

 - Joyce Hwang

Recent News

Joyce Hwang.

Hwang's "Bat Cloud" is a hanging canopy of vessels designed and constructed to support bat habitation. It is installed in Buffalo's Tifft Nature Preserve. Photo by Joyce Hwang

Selected Work

  • Elevator B
    5/30/12
    Elevator B is a 22 -foot-tall, free-standing steel, glass and cypress tower that was raised in "Silo City," an area along the Buffalo River where several massive abandoned grain elevators are located. The bee colony that now inhabits the tower was living in the walls of a long unused outbuilding destined for rehabilitation.
  • Beyond patronage: reconsidering models of practice
    4/8/15
    Assistant professor of architecture Martha Bohm, MArch graduate Gabrielle Printz & associate professor of architecture Joyce Hwang examine the shifting landscape of patronage within the field of architecture.
  • Hidden in plain sight
    5/30/19
    Hidden in Plain Sight is Joyce Hwang and Nerea Feliz's proposal for a series of urban furnishings that aim to amplify and bring awareness to various forms of urban “life” through visual, tactile and ecological means. The project is designed to support an inclusive web of interdependent species, both human and non-human.