Jennifer Lee AIA LEEDAP co-founded OBRA Architects in 2000 in New York with Pablo Castro FAIA. A graduate of Harvard College cum laude and Cooper Union, she has taught at Pratt, Cooper Union, HKU, and Korea National University of Arts. She received the 2022 John Q. Hejduk Award, 2007 Urban Visionary Emerging Talent, 2006 NYFA Fellow, and 2003 SAH de Montëquin Senior Fellow. Lee is a licensed architect in NY, NJ, DC, MD, a LEED-Accredited Professional, former Seoul City Public Architect, and leads OBRA as a NYC DDC Design Excellence contract recipient and NYS OGS term contract holder.

Based in New York City, OBRA Architects is an international architectural design and planning firm, working on projects of urban and community impact that create socially sustainable buildings and environments. OBRA is committed to searching for the unique opportunity to develop a singular architecture—one that is not dull or insensitive to the needs of people, but rather manages, through sensitive design, to be both intelligent in construction and generous in living potentialities. The firm is actively entrepreneurial and operates to try to advance the way architecture impacts communities and environments. At the same time, the work aims to originate from pragmatism and realism that harnesses local energies and inspired clients and institutions seeking change through architecture, design, and urban planning.

OBRA successfully designs public, cultural, and social spaces, earning awards from the AIA, Chicago Athenaeum, Kim Swoo Geun Preview Prize, and the Architectural League. Their work has been exhibited at MoMA, PS1, the Guggenheim, and the National Art Museum of China. MMCA Seoul’s commission, Perpetual Spring, The Climate-Correcting Machine, can be viewed at www.perpetualspring.org, and the competition-winning KONNEXCHEON Pavilion is on view at Seoul’s Cheonggye Stream until October 2026. OBRA’s work stirs the imagination, combining architectural innovation with physical and virtual universal access, expanding audiences, and leveraging design to engage communities on critical environmental and social issues.