Barbara Knecht

Barbara Knecht, R.A. is Director of Design at Adaptive Environments, an international, educational nonprofit organization committed to enhancing the experiences of people of all ages and abilities through excellence in design. She is also co-director of IHP “Cities in the 21st Century,” an undergraduate travel study program, and a consultant to Westhab, Inc. an affordable housing and community development organization.

Ms. Knecht has worked for the City of New York and consulted with not for profit agencies to produce several thousand units of affordable housing. She has researched and written dozens of articles on architectural technology and urban issues. Her work in universal design and accessibility dates back thirty years and has informed all her projects with a human centered design perspective.

Ms. Knecht holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of California, Berkeley and a Master of Architecture from Columbia University. She was awarded a Kinne Fellowship from Columbia University, a Loeb Fellowship at Harvard University, and received a Graham Foundation grant. She serves on the Metropolitan Life/Enterprise Foundation Awards for Excellence in Affordable Housing, the Board of Directors of Care for the Homeless, and the Streetscape committee of the Municipal Art Society. Ms. Knecht is based in Boston and New York where she is a licensed architect and registered as a WBE.