b. 1996, Boston, MA
Ilana Curtis is learning, writing, researching, and designing her way through the MDes-Publics program at Harvard University Graduate School of Design. Her design experience is a collection of creative outputs across scales, places and collaborations, pursuing novel departures for expanding design traditions. Her coursework centers on understanding the nature of memory, belonging, and repair in cities today especially in regard to the experiences of historically marginalized groups.
She is interested in exploring architectural exhibitions, from large scale festivals to pop-up installations, as productive spaces of interdisciplinary encounter. She started examining this topic as a researcher, designer, and project manager for Now What?! Advocacy, Activism, and Alliances in American Architecture since 1968, a traveling exhibit that offers an in-depth look at diversity and activism in the design professions since 1968. The traveling exhibition opens in Boston in March 2022 and includes a special section, “Boston Changemakers” which incorporates the research of the JTerm course Ilana taught. Since then, Ilana has been eager to pursue more teaching and educational planning opportunities.
Outside her studies she works as an Editorial Assistant for the Harvard Design Magazine and Academic Writing Tutor at the Loeb library and occasionally contributes to Metropolis Magazine and Architectural Record.
