Rate My Professor Mehrdad Hadighi

Mehrdad Hadighi is the Stuckeman Professor in Advanced Design Studies and Professor of Architecture in the Department of Architecture at Pennsylvania State University, a position he has held since 2012. He served as Department Head and Stuckeman Chair in Integrative Design from 2012 to 2022. Prior to Penn State, Hadighi was Professor of Architecture at the State University of New York at Buffalo from 2009 to 2011 and Chair of its Department of Architecture from 2005 to 2010, following appointments as Associate Professor (1998-2008) and Assistant Professor (1994-1998). He co-directed the Center for the Study of Space at Buffalo from 1998 to 2002. His academic credentials include a PhD in Comparative Literature from SUNY Buffalo in 2021, with a dissertation titled Between System and Improvisation: A Comparative Study of Le Corbusier’s Writing and Building; a post-professional Master of Architecture from Cornell University in 1986; and Bachelor of Architecture and Bachelor of Fine Arts in Studio Arts from the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1983. A registered architect in New York since 1989, Hadighi founded Studio for Architecture in 1988, focusing on research through commissions, competitions, and site-specific installations. He has held visiting positions such as Distinguished Guest Professor at INHA University (2001), Distinguished Visiting Professor at the University of Arizona (2000), and Gensler Visiting Critic at Cornell (1991-1992).

Hadighi’s scholarly pursuits center on parallels between 20th-century art, critical theory, and architecture’s constructive principles. Key publications encompass Le Corbusier’s Millowners Association Building: Between the Beautiful and the Sublime (Birkhäuser, 2025), Tschumi’s Architectural Manifestoes (Kasra, 2015), Twisted (editor with Tsz Yan Ng and Marc Neveu, ACTAR, 2019), WWW Drawing (director, ACTAR, 2020), llAW of WAll (Applied Research and Design Publishing, 2015), and Banham in Buffalo (editor, ORO Editions, 2011). His projects feature in books including Architecture Today (2016), Concrete (2015), and Green Architecture. Monographs include Mehrdad Hadighi (Sharestan, 2008) and ROVING PICTURES, snapshots (2003). Awards include selection as one of Wallpaper* magazine’s “25 most intriguing, innovative and intrepid architects” (2004), Architectural Record’s “10 Young Firms Reshaping the Globe” in Design Vanguard (2003), New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowships (2000, 1994), Glass Award for Green Lantern (2007), Special Jury Prize for Best Conceptual Design in Studentenheim + Bauernmarkt, Glockengasse (1995), and Joint Winner in Peace Garden International Design Competition (1989).