Karen Bausman

Karen Bausman, AIA, FAAR, is an educator and licensed architect registered to practice in New York. She leads Women-Owned Business Enterprise-certified Karen Bausman + Associates (KB+A) in Manhattan. Since 2011, she has been a Pratt Institute School of Architecture faculty member. Before arriving at Pratt, Karen held distinguished teaching positions at other universities, including the Eliot Noyes Professor of Architectural Theory (Chair) at Harvard University Graduate School of Design and the Eero Saarinen Visiting Professor of Architectural Design (Chair) at Yale University. Karen taught Advanced Architectural Design at Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation from 1990 to 2004.

Recipient of the Rome Prize, Karen has researched, published, and exhibited her work extensively over her academic and professional career. Academic Influence named Karen one of the top women leaders in STEM in 2020 in recognition of her achievements in teaching architecture through the intersection of crucial disciplines. Her design research has been supported by a Pratt School of Architecture Faculty Fellowship, a Rome Prize Fellowship from the American Academy in Rome, two New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowships in Architecture (NYFA), the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), the New York State Council for the Arts (NYSCA), Creative Time, Artists Space, the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, (LMCC) and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. She received the President’s Citation of Outstanding Contributions in the Field of Architecture from The Cooper Union, her Alma Mater, and was inducted into the Cooper Union Hall of Fame.

Karen currently is an Adjunct Associate Professor of Architecture – CCE. She is a member of d.r.a., the Center for Design Research for undergraduate architecture. She leads Wind Power NYC, a Pratt research consortium she co-founded to study how energy source issues impact built environments and how new technologies can be integrated into urban design. She co-established the Wind Power NYC Archive at Pratt in 2020.

Karen’s architecture firm, KB+A, is the current A/E Prime holder of multiple, multiyear Design Excellence contracts with the City of New York. Her firm supports progressive civic leaders who are reimagining the sustainable New York waterfront. Karen’s firm received the 2022 Lucy G. Moses Preservation Award from the New York Landmarks Conservancy for Highbridge Water Tower and Step-Street.

Karen is a Design Excellence National Peer for the Office of the Chief Architect at the General Services Administration, Washington, D.C. She is an active American Institute of Architects member.

B.Arch., The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, School of Architecture