Adrian Mcdermott

Education

University of Illinois at Chicago, School of Architecture – Masters of Architecture 2008
Northern Illinois University, College of Fine Arts - Bachelor of Fine Arts 1998

Biography

Adrian McDermott is an Adjunct Professor in the School of Architecture & Urban Planning (SARUP) at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM).

Professionally, he is the Director of Design, Architecture at Ware Malcomb, an international architecture firm with offices in 27 cities and 4 countries in North and South America. Previously, he has held Senior Designer and Director level positions with Skidmore Owings & Merrill and Gensler, focusing on the conceptualization and realization of a wide range of project typologies and programming.

Academically, his work explores the intersections of speculative design, narrative worldbuilding, and emerging technologies. With an emphasis on how architecture operates not only as a material craft but also as a cultural and political tool for imagining alternative futures, he emphasizes the integration of nontraditional methods—narrative writing, cinematic storyboarding, conceptual photography, and science fiction studies—to cultivate a design practice that is rigorous, critical, and imaginative.