DS+R completed two of the largest architecture and planning initiatives in New York City’s recent history: the adaptive reuse of an obsolete, industrial rail infrastructure into the High Line, a 1.5 mile-long public park, and the transformation of Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts’ half-century-old campus. The studio has also completed the 35-acre Zaryadye Park adjacent to St. Basil’s Cathedral and Red Square in Moscow. They are currently working on large urban public spaces in Madrid and Milan.
The studio has also worked with global cultural institutions to expand access to the arts. The Broad is a contemporary art museum in Los Angeles offering free admission, whose visitorship reflects a comparatively younger and more diverse contemporary arts audience, while the V&A East Storehouse, under construction in London, will bring much of the collection out of storage and into public view for the first time. DS+R also completed two projects that have reshaped New York’s cultural landscape: the surgical renovation and expansion of MoMA, which brings the museum’s vast collection closer to the public, and The Shed, a start-up multi-arts institution originally conceived by DS+R.
DS+R’s approach to rethinking cultural institutions and civic spaces grew out of self-generated and alternative projects that blur the boundaries between architecture, art and performance. Many of the studio’s independent works engage materials indigenous to the site, from Traffic, a guerilla installation of 3,000 traffic cones organized in a grid in New York’s Columbus Circle to the Blur Building, a pavilion made of fog on Lake Neuchâtel for the Swiss Expo. As co-creator, -producer, and –director, the studio’s most recent self-generated work is The Mile-Long Opera, a free, choral performance featuring 1,000 singers atop the High Line that reflected on the alienating speed of change in the contemporary city. The studio has also researched, curated and designed a number of interactive installations covering a wide range of subjects, including: the Costume Institute’s Charles James: Beyond Fashion and Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the The Catholic Imagination, which have recorded two of the highest attendances for any exhibition in the history of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York; The Art of Scent, a sensory exhibition on the olfactory arts at the Museum of Arts and Design; and Exit, an immersive data-driven installation investigating global human migration patterns, most recently exhibited at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris. Most recently, the studio completed the interpretative installation for The Hare with Amber Eyes at the Jewish Museum in New York and the environmental design for Deep Blue Sea, a collaboration with choreographer Bill T. Jones at the Park Avenue Armory.
DS+R has authored several books: The High Line (Phaidon Press, 2015), Lincoln Center Inside Out: An Architectural Account (Damiani, 2013), Flesh: Architectural Probes (Princeton Architectural Press, 2011), Blur: The Making of Nothing (Harry N. Abrams, 2002), and Back to the Front: Tourisms of War (Princeton Architectural Press, 1996).
DS+R is committed to contributing to the long-term vitality and sustainability of cities. Together with Director of Sustainable Design, Sean A. Gallagher, our studio collaborates with the world’s foremost experts in emerging technologies and natural environments to explore innovative approaches for strengthening the relationships between people, the built environment, and natural habitats.
Collaboration with both local communities and global experts is central to our design process, as it is crucial for developing diverse pathways to carbon neutrality. Every location has its own unique social and environmental characteristics, requiring tailored strategies to support its future growth and meet the aspirations of its people.
We take pride in seeking out emerging social and environmental opportunities that create unexpected experiences, fostering awareness and excitement for the future of design in the built environment. Our process is experimental, producing techniques that transcend conventional professional practices and serve as a test bed for ideas that deepen connections between the public, social spaces, and ecological networks.
DS+R is committed to fostering diversity, equity, and inclusion in our studio, our collaborating teams, the architectural spaces we design, and the communities in which they reside.
The core values of diversity, equity, and inclusion in our practice begins with a work environment based on equality of opportunity that welcomes participation from everyone, no matter their background, race, sex, age, disability, sexual orientation, religion or belief, gender assignment, marriage or civil partnership status, or pregnancy/maternity status. Our own partnership reflects a diversity of life experiences, our 110 staff members come from over 25 countries around the globe, and we recognize that the success of our work is the result of talented professionals representing a diversity of perspectives and backgrounds working together in a spirit of mutual respect to pursue the best ideas possible. We are proud to have built a creative and inclusive work environment that nurtures authenticity, individual expression, and equality.
We understand that building communities is a shared and ongoing investment that begins with educating the future stewards of the places we design in. In our recruiting and outside professional development activities, we actively encourage young people from diverse backgrounds to pursue careers in architecture and related fields that serve the built environment.
