Office for Art and Architecture works internationally across the fields of art, architecture, and urban design in pedagogy, exhibition, research, and practice.
Environment is Everything.
We believe in working with nature towards regenerative practices.
Cold Spring, New York
Photo © Office for Art and Architecture
What We Have To Lose
An Eco Developed Super 8 film funded by WIFT, Women in Film and Television Sweden
Konstepidemin
Video © Office for Art and Architecture
Walker Street
Tribeca
Monotype, Oil Based Ink on Cotton Paper
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
A Home for Mussels
Introductory design studio student work designing systems for the growth of mussels, filtering pollutants from urban waterways. Patterns allowed enclosure and water flow and showcased the critical role light and shadow play in design. These structures were evaluated functionally, and then at an alternate scale, becoming architecture.
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
Work
60 hours of architectural work compressed into 8 minutes of video. Produced in residence and exhibited at Art Omi.
Video © Office for Art and Architecture
Where do you find joy.
Monotype, Oil Based Ink on Cotton Paper produced in residence at Konstepidemin
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
Ghosthouse
A film about the power of nature and the ephemerality of the home we've made within it. Produced in residence and exhibited at Art Omi.
Video © Office for Art and Architecture
Brown University
John Hay, Carnegie Library Renovation
Renovation of cultural heritage project including adaptation for accessibility, consideration of the role of the library in contemporary society and education, as well as the design and fabrication supervision of new lighting fixtures inspired by no longer existent historic pendants.
with Selldorf Architects
Photo © Creative Commons
Sometimes there are no words.
Oil on Panel.
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
Christie’s New York Auction House
Renovation of the lobby and gallery exhibition spaces of Christie's East Wing at Rockefeller Center
with Selldorf Architects
Photo © Office for Art and Architecture
The low light of afternoon shines in.
Monotype, Oil Based Ink on Cotton Paper
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
Residential Development
The design of community oriented, permanently affordable housing in Ghent New York at Art Omi.
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
East End Avenue
This renovation for an art collector's Upper East Side home modernized and upgraded a post war apartment to meet the needs of it's owners. Special focus was paid to lighting design with the inclusion of many sources of light, including a Noguchi pendant, and the couples desire for a formal living space that accommodated both a concealed TV and concealed high quality speakers was solved with a custom designed media credenza with acoustically transparent fabric doors.
Photo © Office for Art and Architecture
Housing Typologies
Pencil on paper
Initial design thinking / preparatory sketches for a study on the typologies of home and their impact on community and individuality.
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
East End Avenue
A tiny bathroom that once had a built in tub was renovated to allow for the most floor area possible, yet still with ample storage by creating a sinuous stone counter, an oversized medicine cabinet, and a towel cabinet recessed into the space of an adjacent closet. simple white tiles with stone trims and classic porcelain tile for create a sense of timelessness.
Photo © Office for Art and Architecture
Swiss Institute for Contemporary Art
New York City
Conversion of a purpose built bank building into an arts institution, including a publicly accessible rooftop, bookstore, and ample exhibition space.
with Selldorf Architects
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
Scandinavia Summer Abroad
For a Sustainable Future, 7 weeks in Copenhagen, Stockholm, Göteborg, and Oslo focused on regenerative practices and carbon negative materials.
Photo © Office for Art and Architecture
Malama Learning Center
A sustainable center for culture and environment, the tower allows for view of the region as well as for ventilation through narrow floor plates. The building is rooted into the ground by its public outdoor amphitheater.
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
Environmental Analysis
An essential part of the design process, both analogue and program based environmental impact analysis and energy use modeling.
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
Brooklyn 3 Family Home
This renovation from systems to furnishings of a derelict townhouse focused on longterm flexibility for a young family, a sense of daylight, and loads of clever storage.
Photo © Magda Biernat Photography
Facade Renovation of a Brooklyn Townhouse
Challenges are Opportunities
Color makes such a critical difference. This home had experienced decades of neglect and, while paint removal was deemed too toxic and costly, new paint, in carefully studied colors transformed the building.
Photo © Magda Biernat Photography
A Home for Mussels
Introductory Design Studio Syllabus focused on light, scale, and experience. Students design systems for the growth of mussels, filtering pollutants from urban waterways. Patterns allowed enclosure and water flow and showcased the critical role light and shadow play in design. These structures were evaluated functionally, and then at an alternate scale, becoming architecture.
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
MoMa
Emerging Ecologies Exhibition Review
A critical review of MoMa's 2024 exhibition on American environmentalism calling for foregrounding of diverse voices and radical protest in lieu of nostalgia.
Image © Journal of Architectural Education
A Home for Mussels
Introductory design studio student work designing systems for the growth of mussels, filtering pollutants from urban waterways. Patterns allowed enclosure and water flow and showcased the critical role light and shadow play in design. These structures were evaluated functionally, and then at an alternate scale, becoming architecture.
Image © Office for Art and Architecture
Typologies of Home
Plaster and brass models for a study on the typologies of home and their impact on community and individuality produced in residency and exhibited at Art Omi.
Photo © Office for Art and Architecture
Who We Are
Office for Art and Architecture works internationally across the fields of art, architecture, and urban design in exhibition, pedagogy, research, and practice.
Office for Art and Architecture, is at its core, collaborative:
we collaborate with clients to shape spaces and objects,
we collaborate across disciplines to produce artistic research.
In a complex, chaotic, and too often disposable world we believe in shaping interesting simplicity that becomes more beautiful with age.
Office for Art and Architecture is currently led by Carrie Bobo. Carrie grew up in Oklahoma where her family raises bison on the open plains. After receiving a Professional Degree in Architecture she moved to New York City. There she worked with Eight Inc. designing retail experiences for Apple, Coach, and Nokia before pursuing a Masters in Fine Arts. She then worked with A+I creating office environments tailored to the needs of the world’s most successful businesses. Then she worked with Annabelle Selldorf gaining a breadth of experience in gallery, residential, and institutional projects, designing projects for, among others, Swiss Institute for Contemporary Art, Christie’s Auction House, Pratt University, and Château Haut-Brion winery in Bordeaux including exhibition design for Frank Stella at the Whitney Museum of American Art before moving to Sweden to practice architecture, design, and city planning in a European context. It was there the idea of Office for Art and Architecture was born.
Our work has been recognized internationally including for the Malama Learning Center in Kapolei, Hawaii and the New Holmenkollbakken in Oslo, Norway, has been shown in galleries throughout New York City as well as at Liljevalchs Contemporary Art Museum in Stockholm, Sweden, Sotheby’s in New York City, and is included in Soho House’s arts collection. We’ve participated in residencies including with Art Omi, Konstepidemin, and WIFT, Women in Film and Television Sweden. Projects we’ve contributed to have been published in The New York Times, ArchPaper, Architectural Digest, Wallpaper, and Aperture among others.
We believe in the cliché that the most sustainable building is the one never built. We should demolish nothing, and intelligently preserve and adaptively reuse the existing resources of our built environment.
We believe in thick wall sustainability, an approach that implements simple vernacular methods before resorting to technological approaches. We view vernacular construction through the lens of established building technologies that hold promise for a contemporary regenerative architecture. We believe both academic research and artistic production have the power to make an impact. As we noted in our review of MoMA’s exhibition Emerging Ecologies, we don’t have time left for nostalgia as we sit at the precipice of climate destruction. We must advocate for decarbonization through protest and action.
Carrie has taught as a Professor of Practice at NJIT and as part time faculty at Parsons New School.
Photo © Luzena Rose Adams
Contact Us
At Office for Art and Architecture we believe art and design can provide respite from the devices we obsessively inhabit.
