Madeeha Merchant, Assoc. Aia Email & Phone Number

Madeeha Yasin Merchant is Pakistani-American architect and design justice advocate, leading a mission driven practice to build equitable institutions. She is also the founder of Urban Justice League (UJL), a nonprofit research think tank exploring the complex dynamics of data, ethics and urban justice. Urban justice encompasses all; social, racial, spatial, economical, climate, ecological and environmental. Through the lens of data and ethics, UJL aims to amplify the voices of the marginalized and disenfranchised citizens; enabling them to seek justice for the kind of ‘slow violence’, inflicted upon them, their people and their lands —often through institutions of power; global, state or colonial. In her work, cartography elucidate both literal and metaphorical landscapes of structural and systemic inequalities embedded deep within our societies.A systems engineer and design advocate at heart, she builds/re:builds. From just spaces and future imaginaries to integrated frameworks and design interventions that use data to disrupt dominance —challenging power hierarchies in our everyday lives. By designing spaces, writing algorithms, engaging cartography & repurposing computational tools from across a range of disciplines; neuroscience, environmental science, data science, geography, architecture and planning —she strives to build an equitable future.Pursuing both academic research and architectural practice, Madeeha trained under the Pritzker Laureate Renzo Piano, in Paris working on Columbia University's Manhattanville Campus and later on the Moynihan Train Hall - Penn Station, in New York, as an Architecture Professional at SOM. She was an Associate Research Scholar at Columbia GSAPP and a Tow fellow at Columbia School of Journalism. She received a B.Eng in systems engineering from the University of Massachusetts - Amherst and an M.Arch from Columbia University.Madeeha is a long-standing member of the IEEE, the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) and an Associate member of the American Institute of Architects (AIA). Her work has been published in Volume, Domus, Wired, Abstract, Harvard Design Review and the IEEE Journal and exhibited at several exhibitions and biennales. She has given several talks and workshops, including the UN, Columbia University, MIT Media Lab, RPI, Eyeo Festival, Satellite Summit and NASA. As an architect and academic, Madeeha’s lifelong mission lies at the intersection of urban science and design justice to build lives, one institution at a time. Madeeha also trains as a alpine mountaineer —in dreams to summit K2.