Tiffany Abernathy, AIA, '03
Adjunct Professor of the Practice
(574) 631-9210
Tiffany Abernathy is an architect and educator, has served as Director of US Projects at John Simpson Architects since 2014, and runs her own multi-disciplinary design consultancy, Forms Qua Objects.
She has earned degrees from the University of Miami School of Architecture (BArch) and the University of Notre Dame Graduate School of Architecture (MArch), and a diploma at The Architectural Association (GradDiplCons AA) before passing the Examination in Professional Practice – Part 3 ARB/RIBA from The Bartlett School of Architecture with commendation. Her Master’s thesis at Notre Dame (ND) focusing on the rehabilitation of the San Isidro neighborhood in Havana, Cuba won her a Tinker Pre-Dissertation Award from the Kellogg Institute for International Studies and contributed to a fellowship in Ancient Corinth, Greece to study the Seventh Century Temple on Temple Hill under Professor Robin Rhodes.
Her professional experience ranges from artist in residence in the Bahamas to involvement in large-scale urban design projects, campus masterplans, and landmark buildings in the UK and abroad. Having moved to London to work for Porphyrios Associates in 2003, she later joined John Simpson Architects (JSA). In 2005, she received the inaugural Rieger-Graham Prize from the ICAA and completed her Affiliated Rome Prize Fellowship the following year (AFAAR ‘07).
Tiffany has worked on over 35 major projects for JSA and coordinated three publications on the firm over the past twenty years. She is licensed to practice in the state of New York, is an AIA member and RIBA affiliated member, Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, the Society of Fellows at the American Academy in Rome, and the INTBAU College of Traditional Practitioners.
Tiffany was an inaugural Michael C. Duda Visiting Professor of the Practice at the University of Notre Dame in Spring 2021, was awarded Undergraduate Educator of the Year for the 2021-2022 Academic Year, and is part of the fifth-year thesis faculty Spring 2023. She was Summer Studio Lead at the new Ax:son Johnson Centre for the Study of Classical Architecture (CSCA) at the University of Cambridge in 2022 and will steer the next cohort in Sweden and Cambridge during the Summer 2023. She was appointed to INTBAU’s Board of Trustees in March 2023 and will be teaching at ND’s Rome Global Gateway (RGG) next Fall. She will be back in South Bend teaching fifth-year thesis for the Spring 2024 semester.
Tiffany is currently collaborating on two independent ‘regenerative culture’ initiatives involving education and the nature of transatlantic cities—specifically the exchange and achievements in the US and Europe —as well as an interdisciplinary research lab incorporating documentation, design (R+D), and fabrication.
Areas of Expertise
- Classical Architecture
- Urban Design