Barry Wark

Barry Wark is an architect and designer known for work that attempts to redefine environmental architecture in the age of ecological awareness. Born in Scotland and now based in New York, his practice is shaped by an early familiarity with buildings as artifacts that age, stain, erode, and change—formed as much by climate and use as by design intent. His work treats architecture not as a fixed object, but as something continuously altered by its environment over time.

Across projects, his work is recognized for material and spatial qualities that resist clear distinctions between what is made and what emerges over time. Buildings, objects, and assemblies are designed to register climate, exposure, and use, promoting the display of processes such as weathering, accumulation, and decay. This approach produces architectures that situate aesthetics as central to the design of environmental architecture, supported by circular material strategies and computational intelligence.

Wark has taught and held academic appointments internationally, including at the University of Pennsylvania, the Bartlett School of Architecture, the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, Texas A&M University, Oxford Brookes University, and the Architectural Association Visiting School, and is a frequent invited lecturer and critic at schools of architecture worldwide. His work has been widely published in Frame, Dezeen, Vanity Fair, and STIR, and exhibited internationally, including at the Dubai Museum of the Future and the Venice Biennale.