“[Future Firm’s] projects work hard and on many levels – bringing together architecture, community, and culture in a powerful mix that inspires and enriches the lives of its users.”
Team
According to inspirational posters and coffee mugs, 19th-century South Pole explorer Earnest Shackleton (1874-1922) placed an ad in the Times that read: “MEN WANTED: For hazardous journey, small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful, honor and recognition in case of success.” This ad—whose original has never been located and is likely a fabrication—has a certain macho appeal: only the hardiest dare apply. This tale, however, enforces the myth that to achieve great heights, we must suffer in darkness and anonymity. Instead of holding up false heroics, we look to Shackleton’s contemporary, mountaineer George Mallory (1886-1924). In contrast, Mallory wrote in an unpublished article “The Gambler” (1924): “To win the game [the mountaineer] has first to reach the mountain's summit— but, further, he has to descend in safety.”
Future Firm is a mountain climbing team, with diverse perspectives, complementary expertise, and a shared drive built on collaboration. We summit together and also work to descend to safety together: a metaphor for the combined challenges of producing great architecture and requiring that we, collectively, “make it home.” “Making it home” means that we participate in civic, cultural, and personal life. By participating in the rhythms of the city, we deliver design ideas and new knowledge that emerges from our living in the world, embracing and critiquing it.
Partner
Ann Lui is an architect and Assistant Professor of Practice at the University of Michigan. Previously, she practiced at SOM, Ann Beha Architects, and Morphosis Architects. She has held teaching positions at SAIC, University at Buffalo, and was the Cullinan Visiting Professor at Rice University. Ann was co-curator of the U.S. Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale 2018 titled Dimensions of Citizenship. She co-edited Public Space? Lost and Found (2015) and Log 54 “Coauthoring” (2022). Ann was recently named Newcity’s “Designer of the Moment” (2018) and Crain’s “40 Under 40” (2018). She holds an SMArchS from MIT and a BArch from Cornell University. She is a member of the Steering Committee for the Metropolitan Planning Council’s Zoning and Land Use assessment and a member of the Advisory Committee for the State of Illinois Asian American and Pacific Islander Business Collective (IAAPIBC).
Partner
Craig Reschke, AIA is an architect and founding principal of Future Firm. Previously, Craig was a project architect at SOM and RODE Architects, where he led the design of buildings at many scales in the U.S. and abroad. In addition to his work at Future Firm, Craig also co-founded Hem House to bring contemporary residential projects to market with design-forward projects that reimagine the housing industry through architecture, construction, and user experience. He holds a MLA from Harvard’s Graduate School of Design, where he graduated with the Jacob Weidenmann Prize, and a BArch from the University of Tennessee Knoxville.
Principal
Linda Chavez is an architect and principal at Future Firm leading design for projects across scales, with a focus on civic and community driven spaces. She has developed her career in Chicago, where she has worked with Gensler, JGMA and completed award winning work for Northeastern Illinois University, Columbia College Chicago, and Northwestern University. Linda’s commitment to the community extends far beyond her project work – as a Latino, female architect – she is focused on creating democratic spaces that attend and understand the intersectionality between feminism and racism, especially for the Latino community in the US. She has been recognized as Crain's 2022 notable executives of color in construction and commercial real estate. She received her Bachelor’s degree in Architecture from Tec de Monterrey, her Master in Project Management from Northwestern University and holds an Honorary Doctorate degree in Arts by Columbia College Chicago.
Associate
Donna Ryu is a Korean-American designer. She holds a Bachelor of Science in Architecture from the University of Maryland and a Master of Architecture & Certificate in Urban Design from the University of Virginia. Gratefully, design has always been part of her upbringing - her mother went to art school and has a love for interior design; her father is a skilled tailor and has an innate aptitude for renovation and construction. Together, they run a small tailor shop and liquor store which allowed Donna the opportunities to learn through travel - her experiences have placed her in South Korea, China, and India to name a few. Her love of everything outdoors, climbing, and hip hop (particularly the glittery era of 90s hip hop) run deep. Home is wherever she is at the time but her roots are in Maryland.
Associate
Andrew Phyfer, RA, LEED Green Associate is a registered architect passionate about the empowerment great design can bring. Outside his design role and inspired by his contribution to the North Lawndale Incubator, he and the project fellows formed a collaborative focusing on advocacy through spatial research and visualization. Andrew holds a BSc.Arch 2016 from the University of Pretoria, South Africa and more recently, in his adopted country, a M.Arch 2020 from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His thesis titled "Exurban Futures: A handbook for architectural potential on an emerging frontier" reimagines Chicagoland’s periphery.
Associate
Andrea Hunt is a registered architect who holds an M. Arch from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a BS. Arch from the University of Illinois Chicago. In addition to her role at Future Firm, she maintains an artistic practice that explores ecological and institutional presence in public territories, such as Central Mexico’s Mezquital Valley, which embodies a regional water and sewage crisis; the contested, yet vital, occupation of a shared primeval forest between Poland and Belarus; and the cultural impact of state monuments and infrastructure on public space in Warsaw. Andrea is driven by learning -through sound, sculpture, video, and drawing- about histories that shape our built environment, drawing connections between ecological, social, and cultural narratives to deepen our understanding of the spaces we inhabit.
Designer
Philana Quan is an architectural designer from Northern Virginia who is curious about design, equity, and storytelling. She is deeply influenced by having grown up playing music, creating art, and listening to her family's oral histories. While receiving her B.Arch from Virginia Tech, she spent a transformative semester studying in Chicago and returned to the city post-graduation to join Future Firm. Her undergraduate thesis titled “Suburban Cultural Infill” reimagined the suburbs, through the eyes of a Vietnamese-Buddhist temple community, as a canvas for new programming and design possibilities.
Designer
Claire Wagner is an architectural designer driven by a belief in architecture’s potential to make a positive public impact. She brings a multidisciplinary perspective and commitment to collaborative, equitable, and sustainable design outcomes in the civic realm. Her professional experience spans typologies and scales, from single-family residences to large-scale cultural, institutional, and educational projects. With a liberal arts background in art history and psychology as well as teaching experience in secondary education, Claire did not take the direct route to architecture. She earned her Master of Architecture from Rice University in Houston. Her research has taken her to Japan, Paris, and back to Chicago for her thesis focused on designing sites of community care, collective ownership, and resilience in closed schools.
Office Coordinator
Tami has over thirty years of experience in construction, with experience at all levels of office management and coordination. Tami received her degree in Business Management and has developed personal and professional growth with various sized companies. Her strength is in supporting the goals and visions of a business with emphasis on implementation and follow through.
News & Press
2025
-
The Architect’s Newspaper, “Future Firm helps expand Chicago’s South Side Community Art Center”
- Black Art in America, “South Side Community Art Center Announces Plans for $15M Renovation and Expansion
2024
- Chicago Sun Times, “Art Institute of Chicago opens its first gallery devoted solely to Korean art”
- Architect's Newspaper, "Chicago-based Future Firm puts people first”
- Chicago Sun-Times, “Community space South Side Sanctuary opens in ‘heart’ of Bronzeville”
- Fox32, “South Side Sanctuary Opens in Bronzeville”
- Beyond the Surface, “Ann Lui | Future of Design” (podcast)
- The Architectural League, I Would Prefer Not To, “Future Firm” (podcast)
- The Ohio State University, “Architecture in the Open City: Ann Lui + Chicago”
2023
- Architect's Newspaper, "AN Interior’s Top 50 Architects and Designers of 2023"
- Chicago Magazine, "How Justice of the Pies Made Its New Shop Accessible"
- Eater, “Superstar Baker Maya-Camille Broussard's Justice of the Pies to Debut Friday“
- Dwell, “Chicago Is Running a Design Contest to Create Infill Housing—Here’s a First Look at Submissions”
- Dwell, “Chicago Calls On the World’s Best to Design Infill Housing on Its Thousands of Empty Lots”
- Architect’s Newspaper, “An exhibition by Himali Singh Soin at the Art Institute of Chicago situates viewers within mythic catastrophes”
- Architect’s Newspaper, “Architects and designers share the best interior materials they’re currently using”
2022
- Architect’s Newspaper, “Future Firm designs a stylish eatery for Chicago’s South Side Bronzeville neighborhood“
- Architect Magazine, “Inside Out: Cultivating a Destination for Community, Local Art, and, of Course, Good Wine“
- Hospitality Design, “Bronzeville Winery Opens in Chicago”
- NewCity, “Design 50 2022: The Fifty People Who Shape Chicago | Ann Lui and Craig Reschke”
- Wallpaper*, “Chicago’s Future Firm aims to spearhead change”
- Dwell, “Here’s How We Fix the Hole in the Middle of the Housing Market”
2021
- Fast Company, “The middle class is being crushed by the housing crisis—and a solution is hiding in plain sight”
- Wallpaper*, “Hem House proposes new Chicago housing solution”
- Azure Magazine, “How Future Firm Finds Inspiration in the ‘Messy Ecology’ of Cities"
- The Republic, “Midnight light: Sears/Cummins building aims to be overnight sensation"
- Wallpaper*, "Architects create Indiana installations as Exhibit Columbus opens”
- Architect’s Newspaper, “Future Firm imbues a Chicago store and community space with flexible furniture”
- Sci-Arc Channel, “On Futures: Future Firm”
2020
- ArchDaily, “Graham Foundation Announces 2020 Individual Grants”
- Wallpaper, “Redesigning The Silver Room community space in Chicago”
- Architect’s Newspaper, “Exhibit Columbus reveals 2020–2021 curatorial theme and Miller Prize recipients”
- NewCity, “Design 50: Who Shapes Chicago”
- Area (Italy), “A new generation of architects paint a diverse community practicing in Chicago
2019
- Architect Magazine, “In Planning Their 'Future Firm,' Future Firm was Born”
- Archinect, “Meet Future Firm, the Chicago-Based Practice Calling on Architects to Visualize Vibrant New Futures”
- Chicago Magazine, “Who’s Got Next?: The Activist Architect”
- Architect Magazine, “Next Progressives: Future Firm”
2018
2017
- Next City, “Chicago Firm Calls for Creating Office of the Public Architect”
- The Architect’s Newspaper, “The Night Gallery projects architectural visualizations into the streets of Chicago”
- Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events, City of Chicago. IncentOvate Grant (with Chicago Architecture Foundation)
- Times Square Alliance with the Urban Design Forum. Times Square Valentine, Invited Finalist
2016
- Archdaily, “Manhattanisms: 30 Firms Envision New York City's Future Through Drawings and Models”
- DNAInfo, “Alleys Transformed Into Main Streets: Could it Happen?”
- WGN, “Re-imagining City Garages”
- Chicago Architect, “Future Firm Seeks Balance Between Innovative and Practical”
- Oslo Architecture Triennale, After Belonging. Honorable Mention for “Cooperative Arctic Hedge Fund”
2015—Before
- Architectural Record, “Exhibition Review: Designing a Presidential Legacy”
- Chicago Prize, Chicago Architectural Club. Honorable Mention for “Obama Drone Aviary”
- Architizer, “Step Right Up to This Traveling Architectural Circus“
- ArchDaily, “Crowdfunding: Transformed Truck To Take Art & Architecture on the Road“
Texts
“Building Code as Battleground: Activism, Amendments, and (Co)Authorship”
in 52: Instruments of Service
Elizabeth Bowie Christoforetti and Jacob Reidel, eds. Harvard Design Magazine, 2024
Download PDF
“Curating Collective Space”
in Futures of the Architectural Exhibition: Mario Ballesteros, Giovanna Borasi, Ann Lui, Ana Miljacki, Zoë Ryan, Martino Stierli, Shirley Surya in Conversation with Students
Reto Geiser and Michael Kubo, eds. Park Books, 2023
Download PDF
“Building Justice”
in Log 59: Observations on architecture and the contemporary city
Bryony Roberts, ed., New York: Anyone Corporation, 2023
Download PDF
Log 54: Coauthoring, New York: Anyone Corporation, 2022
Full Issue
“America: I’ve Given You All And Now I’m Nothing”
in 48: America
Mark Lee and Florencia Rodriguez, eds. Harvard Design Magazine, 2021
Full Issue
“Goodbye to the Amber Glow”
in Nocturnal Landscapes
Iker Gil, ed. Chicago: Mas Context, 2021
Full Book
“Interview”
in Studio Gang: Architecture
Jeanne Gang, ed. Phaidon Press, 2020
Full Book
“Violation City”
in Perspecta 54: Onus
Caroline Acheatel, Paul J. Lorenz, Paul Rasmussen and Alexander Stagg, eds., Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2020
Download PDF
“Toward an Office of The Public Architect”
in Log 48: Expanding Modes of Practice
Bryony Roberts, ed., New York: Anyone Corporation, 2020
Download PDF
“From documents to directives”
in Codify: Parametric and Computational Design in Landscape Architecture,
Bradley Cantrell and Adam Mekies, eds., London; New York: Routledge, 2018
Full Book
“In the Wake of the City: Elmgreen & Dragset’s Dream of Public Space at the Whitechapel Pool”
in Elmgreen and Dragset: This Is How We Bite Our Tongue,
Laura Smith et al., London: Whitechapel Gallery, 2018
Full Book
Dimensions of Citizenship
Los Angeles, CA: Inventory Press, 2018
Read Online
“Reading After Belonging in the Heartland”
in And Now: Architecture Against a Developer Presidency,
James Graham et al., eds., New York: Columbia Books on Architecture and the City, 2017
Read Online
Public Space? Lost and Found,
Cambridge, MA: SA+P Press, 2017
Full Book
“Data Dreams: The Compupter Group and Architecture by Spreadsheet, 1967-84”
in Drawing Futures: Speculations in Comtemporary Drawing for Art and Architecture,
Laura Allen and Luke Caspar Pearson, eds., UCL Press, 2016
Full Book
“Book Review: Pornotopia: An Essay on Playboy’s Architecture and Biopolitics”
in Journal of Architectural Education,
September 7th, 2016
Read Online
“Command Line: The Computer-Aided Office”
in OfficeUS Atlas,
Eva Franch i Gilabert, Michael Kubo, Ana Miljacki and Ashley Schaefer, eds., Zurich: Lars Muller, 2015
Full Book
Thresholds 43: Scandalous,
Cambridge, MA: SA+P Press, 2015
Read Online
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