Michael Dennis

Michael Dennis is an architect and founder of Michael Dennis & Associates in Boston, Massachusetts. The firm’s award-winning work in architecture, campus planning, and urban design has been published nationally and internationally. Michael is an authority on urban design and the development and form of the American campus. He has been in private practice in Boston since 1981, and prior to that in Ithaca, New York since 1970. His work has been directly influenced by his extensive experience in teaching and research. Michael is Professor Emeritus at MIT, where he was the Director of the post-professional Architecture and Urbanism Program and taught Urban Design and Urban Design Theory. Previously he taught at Cornell, Kentucky, Princeton, Rice, Harvard, and Columbia universities. He has been the Thomas Jefferson Professor of Architecture at the University of Virginia, the Eero Saarinen Professor of Architecture at Yale University, the Charles Moore Professor of Architecture at the University of Michigan, and visiting professor at Notre Dame. Michael has lectured widely, and is the author of several books, including Court and Garden: From the French Hôtel to the City of Modern Architecture (MIT Press, 1986); Architecture and the City: Selected Essays (Beacon Street Studio, 2020); Temples and Towns: A Study of the Form, Elements, and Principles of Planned Towns (ORO Editions, 2022); and The Venetian Facade (ORO Editions/Notre Dame School of Architecture, 2024). Over his career Michael has received numerous awards for design and teaching, including the prestigious CNU Athena Medal for his contributions to urbanism. In 2023 he received the ICAA Arthur Ross Award for Education, and in 2024 was awarded the Orlando T. Maione Award for his contributions to the Notre Dame School of Architecture.