Women in architecture have been documented for many centuries, as professional, non-licensed, (or amateur) practitioners, educators and clients. Since architecture became organized as a profession in 1857, the number of women in architecture has been low. At the end of the 19th century, starting in Finland, certain schools of architecture in Europe began to admit women to their programmes of study. In 1980 M. Rosaria Piomelli, born in Italy, became the first woman to hold a deanship of a school of architecture in the United States, as Dean of the City College of New York School of Architecture. As of the 21st century, women have begun to achieve wider recognition within the profession,Sokolina, Anna, ed. The Routledge Companion to Women in Architecture. London and New York: Routledge, 2021. however, the percentage receiving awards for their work remains low. As of 2023, 11.5% of Pritzker Prize Laureates have been female.
Early examples Two European women stand out as early examples of women playing an important part in architecture, designing or defining the development of buildings under construction. In France, Katherine Briçonnet (–1526) was influential in designing the Château de Chenonceau in the Loire Valley, supervising the construction work between 1513 and 1521 and taking important architectural decisions while her husband was away fighting in the Italian wars.M. E. Aubry-Vitet, "Chenonceau", in Revue des deux mondes, no. 69 (1867), p. 855. In Italy, Plautilla Bricci (1616–1690) worked with her brother, Basilio, and alone on chapels and palaces near Rome.
In Britain, there is evidence that Lady Elizabeth Wilbraham (1632–1705) studied the work of the Dutch architect Pieter Post as well as that of Palladio in Veneto, Italy, and the Stadtresidenz at Landshut, Germany.John Millar The first woman architect, The Architects' Journal, 11 November 2010. Retrieved 16 April 2012. She has been put forward as the architect of Wotton House in Buckinghamshire and of many other buildings. It has also been suggested that she tutored Sir Christopher Wren. Wilbraham had to use male architects to supervise the construction work.Jay Merrick Elizabeth Wilbraham, the first lady of architecture, The Independent, 16 February 2011. Retrieved 16 April 2012. There is now much research including that by John Millar to show she may have designed up to 400 buildings including 18 London churches previously attributed to her pupil Sir Christopher Wren.
Towards the end of the 18th century, another Englishwoman, Mary Townley (1753–1839), tutored by the artist Sir Joshua Reynolds, designed several buildings in Ramsgate in south-eastern England including Townley House which is considered to be an architectural gem.Paul Nettleingham, "Townley House in Ramsgate", Michaels Bookshop Ramsgate. Retrieved 16 April 2012. Sara Losh (1785–1853) was an English woman and landowner of Wreay. She has been described as a lost Romantic genius, antiquarian, architect and visionary. Her main work is St Mary's Church (Wreay), Cumbria, but she also constructed various associated buildings and monuments.St Mary's Church Wreay (Accessed Sept 2012)Uglow, Jenny (2012) The Pinecone, Faber and FaberBullen, J. B. (2001) Sara Losh: Architect, Romantic, Mythologist The Burlington Magazine, Vol. 143, No. 1184, Nov., pp. 676–684
Modern pioneers Yet another Englishwoman, Sophy Gray (1814–1871), wife of Robert Gray who became bishop of Cape Town in 1847 assisted in helping her husband with his administrative and social obligations but above all by designing at least 35 of the South African Anglican churches completed between 1848 and 1880, all in the Gothic Revival style in which she showed strong interest."Gray, Sophia (Sophie) Wharton Myddleton", ArteFacts. Retrieved 16 April 2012.
The daughter of a French-Canadian carriage maker, Mother Joseph Pariseau (1823–1902) was not just one of the very earliest female architects in North America but a pioneer in the architecture of the north-western United States. In 1856, together with four sisters from Montreal, she moved to Vancouver, Washington, where she designed eleven hospitals, seven academies, five schools for Native American children, and two orphanages in an area encompassing today's Washington state, northern Oregon, Idaho, and Montana."Mother Joseph", Architect of the Capitol. Retrieved 16 April 2012.
Louise Blanchard Bethune (1856–1913) from Waterloo, New York, was the first American woman known to have worked as a professional architect. In 1876, she took a job working as a draftsman in the office of Richard A. Waite and F.W. Caulkings in Buffalo, New York, where she worked for five years, demonstrating she could hold her own in what was a masculine profession. In 1881, she opened an independent office partnered with her husband Robert Bethune in Buffalo, earning herself the title as the nation's first professional female architect."Louise Blanchard Bethune (1856–1913)" , Women in Architecture (University of Illinois). Retrieved 16 April 2012. She was named the first female associate of the American Institute of Architects (A.I.A.) in 1888 and in 1889, she became its first female fellow.Louise Blanchard Bethune (1856–1913 , Women in Architecture (University of Illinois ). Retrieved 2011-11-14.
Minerva Parker Nichols (1862–1949) was the first American women to work as a professional architect without a male partner. She practiced in the Philadelphia area in the 1880s and 1890s. She graduated from the Philadelphia Normal Art School in 1882 and then completed a two-year course in architectural drawing at the Franklin Institute Drawing School in 1886. Following graduation, she joined the architectural firm of Edwin W. Thorne, taking over his office when he departed in 1889, making Parker Nichols the first independently practicing female architect in the United States. She also completed a certificate at the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Arts in 1889. Between 1888 and 1893, Parker Nichols had over sixty commissions, which were primarily dwellings but also included two spaghetti factories, the Philadelphia New Century Club in 1891, the Queen Isabella Pavilion for the Columbian Exposition Committee, and the Wilmington, Delaware New Century Club in 1893. In 1894, she designed a building for the Browne & Nichols School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. From 1891 to 1895, she taught architecture and historic ornament at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women, now Moore College of Art and Design. She closed her formal practice in Philadelphia in 1896 when she moved to Brooklyn with her husband, but she continued to design buildings throughout her life.Margaret (Molly) Lester, “For Homeowners and Housekeepers: The Architecture of Minerva Parker Nichols in Late Nineteenth-Century America,” The Routledge Companion to Women in Architecture, ed. by Anna Sokolina (Routledge, 2021)Margaret (Molly) Lester, Specialization and Significance: An Assessment of the Career and Works of Minerva Parker Nichols (Masters Thesis), University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA (http://repository.upenn.edu/hp_theses/208/)
Marion Mahony Griffin (née Marion Lucy Mahony; February 14, 1871 – August 10, 1961) was an American architect and artist. She was one of the first licensed female architects in the world, and is considered an original member of the Prairie School. She studied architecture and graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) in 1894. She was the second woman to do so, after Sophia Hayden the designer of the Woman's building at the 1893 Chicago World's Columbian Exposition. Her work in the United States developed and expanded the American Prairie School, and her work in India and Australia reflected Prairie School ideals of indigenous landscape and materials in the newly formed democracies. The scholar Debora Wood stated that Griffin "did the drawings people think of when they think of Frank Lloyd Wright (one of her collaborating architects)." Bernstein, Fred A. (2008). "Marion Mahony Griffin – Architecture". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved March 3, 2018.
Julia Morgan (1872–1957) was an American architect and engineer. She designed more than 700 buildings in California during a long and prolific career. She is best known for her work on Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California. Morgan was the first woman to be admitted to the architecture program at l'École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris and the first female architect licensed in California. She designed many edifices for institutions serving women and girls, including a number of YWCAs and buildings for Mills College. Julia Morgan was the first woman to receive American Institute of Architects’ highest award, the AIA Gold Medal, posthumously in 2014. (See separate Wikipedia entry for Julia Morgan for sources.)
Another early practicing architect in the United States was Emily Williams (1869–1942) from northern California. In 1901, together with her friend Lillian Palmer, she moved to San Francisco where she studied drafting at the California High School of Mechanical Arts. Encouraged by Palmer, she went on to build a number of cottages and houses in the area, including a family home on 1037 Broadway in San Francisco, now a listed building., Women Architects in Northern California, first published in Newsletter of PAC San Jose, Vol. 17, No. 4. Retrieved 16 April 2012.
Theodate Pope Riddle (1868–1946) grew up in a well-to-do background in Farmington, Connecticut, where she hired faculty members to tutor her in architecture. Her early designs, such as that for Hill-Stead (1901), were translated into working drawings by the firm of McKim, Mead and White, providing her with an apprenticeship in architecture. She was the first woman to become a licensed architect in both New York and Connecticut and in 1926 was appointed to the AIA College of Fellows."Women in Architecture" , ARVHA. Retrieved 17 April 2012.
A notable pioneer of the early days was Josephine Wright Chapman (1867–1943). Chapman received no formal education in architecture but went on design a number of buildings before setting up her own firm. The architect of Tuckerman Hall in Worcester, Massachusetts, she is considered to be one of America's earliest and most successful female architects."Josephine Wright Chapman and Tuckerman Hall" , Tuckermanhall.org. Retrieved 17 April 2012.
Virginia Andreescu Haret (1894–1962) was the first Romanian woman to graduate with a degree in architecture in 1919 and the first woman to be Romanian Architectural Inspector General. She continued her studies in Italy before working at the Technical Service of the Ministry of National Education (Romania). Haret designed schools, public buildings, and private homes and represented Romania at international conferences.
Ruth Crawford Mitchell (1890–1984) an advocate for student immigrants at the University of Pittsburgh, conceived, designed and supervised the Nationality Rooms in the Cathedral of Learning.
Olive Tjaden (1904–1997) earned an architecture degree from Cornell University in 1925. She was one of the most prominent female architects in the US Northeast, and the only woman member of the American Institute of Architects for many years. An architecture building at Cornell is named in her honor.
Jane Drew (1911–1996), was an English modernist architect and town planner. The Jane Drew prize is named in her honour.
Elizabeth Wright Ingraham (1922–2013), daughter of John Lloyd Wright and granddaughter of Frank Lloyd Wright, designed approximately 150 buildings in Colorado Springs.
First academic qualifications
Finland