Elizabeth Diller
Professor, Architectural Design
B. Arch., The Cooper Union
Diller, Scofidio + Renfro, New York
www.dsrny.com
Office: Architecture Building S-11
Email: ediller@dsrny.com
Phone: 609-258-3753
Elizabeth Diller founded Diller Scofidio + Renfro (DS+R), an interdisciplinary design studio that has operated at the intersection of architecture, the performing arts, and the visual arts since 1981. Alongside partner Ricardo Scofidio, she was the first architect to be honored by the MacArthur Foundation with a “Genius Grant,” in which the jury stated: “Diller + Scofidio have created an alternative form of architectural practice that unites design, performance, and electronic media with cultural and architectural theory and criticism. Their work explores how space functions in our culture and illustrates that architecture, when understood as the physical manifestation of social relationships, is everywhere, not just in buildings.”
DS+R established its identity through self-generated projects in public spaces that challenged the status quo of the architectural discipline before expanding the practice to include architectural work at all scales, with a particular emphasis on cultural, educational, and civic projects. The studio reached international prominence after completing the Blur Building- a pavilion made of fog for the Swiss Expo 2002- and the widely influential High Line in New York. DS+R has gone on to design significant urban public spaces around the world including the 35-acre Zaryadye Park adjacent to St. Basil’s Cathedral and Red Square in Moscow and two large urban parks currently in development in Madrid and in Milan. After the success of DS+R’s first museum, the ICA in Boston, followed by The Broad in Los Angeles, Diller spearheaded the conception and design of The Shed—a start-up multi-arts institution. She also led the renovation and expansion of MoMA in New York and the Victoria and Albert Museum’s East Storehouse, currently under construction in London. Diller has also built academic spaces for prestigious educational institutions including Stanford University, the Juilliard School, Columbia University, and MIT, where DS+R’s design for the school of architecture is under construction. Most recently, she completed Al-Mujadilah, the first women’s mosque in the Islamic world.
In parallel with her architecture projects, Diller continues to develop independent works for the stage, curatorial and installation projects for museums and public spaces, as well as works for print and alternative media. She has researched, curated and designed installations for institutions around the world including The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, where she designed shows for the Costume institute that have recorded two of the highest attendances for any exhibition in the museum’s history; and the Fondation Cartier in Paris, where she has designed three installations including Exit, an immersive data-driven installation investigating global human migration patterns. She created, produced and directed The Mile-Long Opera, a choral performance featuring 1,000 singers distributed along the High Line. She also recently completed Architecture, Not Architecture, a double-volume monograph on the studio’s cross-disciplinary work which will be published by Phaidon Press in 2025.
Diller serves as a Professor of Architecture at Princeton University and a member of the UN Council on Urban Initiatives.
