#45 - Declare Your Mission with Katie Swenson of MASS Design Group

Katie Swenson is a nationally recognized design leader,
researcher, writer, and educator. She is a Senior Principal of
MASS Design Group, an international non-profit architecture firm
whose mission is to research, build, and advocate for
architecture that promotes justice and human dignity. Before
joining MASS in early 2020, Swenson was vice president of Design
& Sustainability at Enterprise Community Partners, Inc., a
national nonprofit that invested over $43.6 billion in community
development. She founded Enterprise’s National Design Initiative,
directing the Affordable Housing Design Leadership Institute, the
Pre-Development Design Grant, and the Rose Fellowship. The Rose
Fellowship partners emerging architectural designers and cultural
practitioners with local community development organizations to
facilitate an inclusive approach to development resulting in
sustainable and affordable communities. 


A prolific writer, she released two books in the fall of 2020:
Design with Love: At Home in America, and In Bohemia: A Memoir of
Love, Loss and Kindness, both by Schiffer Publishing. She holds a
Bachelor of Arts in Comparative Literature from the University of
California, Berkeley and a Master of Architecture from The
University of Virginia. Katie was also a Harvard University
Graduate School of Design Loeb Fellow in 2018-2019, and has
taught at the Boston Architectural College and Parsons School of
Design at The New School and lectured extensively on sustainable
community development and affordable housing.