Brian Healy
Brian Healy (born July 18, 1956 in Gary, Indiana) is an American architect, professor of architecture, and painter with studios in Somerville, Massachusetts, and Jackson, New Hampshire.
He is the founder and design director of Brian Healy Architects, an architecture and design firm established in 1985 in Boston, Massachusetts, and a fellow at the American Institute of Architects. He has taught undergraduate and graduate architectural design across North America and is currently the Marlborough Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the University of South Florida in Tampa.
Early life and Education
Brian Healy grew up in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, as one of seven brothers on former farmland in Doylestown. He received his Bachelor of Science in Architecture in 1978 from The Pennsylvania State University and his Master of Architecture from the Yale School of Architecture in 1981 where he studied with James Stirling, John Hejduk, Vincent Scully, and George Kubler, He was also the editor of Perspecta 19: The Yale Architecture Journal (MIT Press; 1982).
After completing his graduate degree, Healy received the William Wirt Winchester Travelling Fellowship from Yale University and the Dinkeloo Traveling Fellowship in Architecture from the Van Allen Institute. The scholarship granted him the opportunity to travel the world for a year and complete a residency at the American Academy in Rome in the Fall of 1983. With a backpack and sketchbook, he travelled across Ireland, Britain, France, Italy, Greece, Crete, Egypt, Sudan, India, Nepal, Thailand, and Taiwan.
At age 26, he designed and built his first project: a home and nursery deep in the Everglades of Estero, Florida. The building was featured in Life Magazine and won Architect Magazine's Progressive Architecture Award in 1984.
Career
He moved from New York City to Boston in 1985 after he received a residential commission on Cape Cod. Healy worked as a designer in the offices of Charles Moore, Cesar Pelli, and Richard Meier before founding his own practice, Brian Healy Architects (BHA) in Boston.
In 2004, Healy was the president of the Boston Society of Architects while on the Board of Directors from 2000-2005. From 2011 to 2014, he served as Design Director at Perkins&Will, a renowned international design firm with a focus on sustainable and socially responsible design. He was elected to the College of Fellows at the American Institute of Architects in 2013.
Healy has designed numerous houses, apartment buildings, and loft renovations across the country including in Florida, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, New York, New Jersey, Illinois, and California.
Among the architect's most prominent buildings are the Children's Chapel, at the Korean Church of Boston in Brookline, Massachusetts; the Student Center at the University of Massachusetts Lowell in Lowell, Massachusetts, the Grant Recital Hall at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island and Lincoln Street Garage in downtown Boston, Massachusetts.
In 2010, architect and longtime Boston Globe critic Robert Campbell described Healy's Children's Chapel to the Korean Church of Boston as "one of Boston's best architectural spaces."" The design work produced by BHA has received over fifty design awards locally, regionally, and nationally.
BHA won the NEA sponsored competitions for Chicago's Initiative for Mixed Income Housing in Chicago, Illinois (2001), the Civic Center at Lake Elsinore, California (2005), and the Mill Center for the Arts in Hendersonville, North Carolina (2007). BHA also won the competition for the Children's Chapel at the Korean Church of Boston in Brookline, Massachusetts (2004).
The firm was a finalist in several national competitions including the Visitors' Center for the Darwin Marin House in Buffalo, New York (2001), Community Housing and Design, Long Beach, California (2002) and Intergenerational Housing in Chicago, Illinois (2003).
It also won eight Progressive Architecture design awards from the magazine Architecture, including one in 2013 for the design of "Floatyard" – a proposed complex of apartments on the waters of Boston Harbor to combat rising sea levels. Healy gave a TEDTalk on the project and the role that architects can play in a world increasingly impacted by climate change.
A monograph of his professional work, Commonplaces, was published by Oscar Riera Ojeda Publishers (ORO) in 2009 with a second volume, Commonplaces: Working on an American Architecture (ORO), published in 2021. In a review, Thomas Fisher for the Yale Publication, Constructs, wrote: "The book serves as a reminder of the consistency and quality of Healy's designs over the last four decades, making him one of the most talented—and yet unsung—architects practicing in America today."
In addition to his architectural work, Healy is a lifelong painter with exhibits in galleries around the country including in Boston, Providence, New Haven, and New York City.
Academia
Since 1988, Healy has taught undergraduate and graduate architectural design studios and seminars at colleges and universities across North America.
Healy has taught architectural design studios and seminars at major universities across North America, including Yale University, Harvard University, University of Pennsylvania, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, The Pennsylvania State University, Washington University in St. Louis, The City College of New York, University of Michigan, McGill University, the Rhode Island School of Design, Dartmouth College, Middlebury College, University of Virginia, University of Florida, University of Arkansas, New Jersey Institute of Technology, Amherst College, Roger Williams University, and the University of Cincinnati.
Healy was the Hideo Sasaki Distinguished Visiting Critic at the Boston Architectural College and Visiting Distinguished Professor in Architecture at The City College of New York, Roger Williams University in Bristol, Rhode Island, and McGill University in Montreal, Quebec.
Healy was the Hideo Sasaki Distinguished Visiting Critic at the Boston Architectural College and Visiting Distinguished Professor in Architecture at The City College of New York, Roger Williams University in Bristol, Rhode Island, and McGill University in Montreal, Quebec.
He completed residencies at the American Academy in Rome, Italy (Fall 1983), the MacDowell Art Colony in Peterborough, New Hampshire (1994), the Dorland Mountain Art Colony in Temecula, California (1998), Artist in Residence at Amherst College in Amherst, Massachusetts (2007), Cameron Visiting Architect at Middlebury College in Middlebury, Vermont (2008), and Gerard Sheff Visiting Professor in Architecture at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec (2009).
From 2001 to 2005, Healy was invited by then-dean Robert A.M. Stern to join the faculty at Yale focusing on the Building Project, a first-year design-build studio and summer program at the Yale School of Architecture.
Selected Professional Work
Houses, Housing & Hotels:
Jackson Studio, Jackson, New Hampshire (2024)
Rural Retreat, Estero, Florida (2023-)
LaTorre Residence, Duxbury, Massachusetts (2021-)
DOT Common, Boston, Massachusetts (2018)
88 Wareham, Boston, Massachusetts (2017)
Kenmore Hotel, Boston, Massachusetts (2014)
Floatyard, Boston, Massachusetts (2014)
Haymarket Square, Boston, Massachusetts (2012)
Maher Residence, Dillon Beach, California (2010-)
Shriver Guest House, Hyannisport, Massachusetts (2009)
Hartman Residence, Dillon Beach, California (2009)
Boathouse, Essex, Massachusetts (2008)
Sound Addition, Charlestown, Rhode Island (2007)
HZ West, Ross, California (2007)
Community Housing, Long Beach, California (2004)
Vineyard House, Saint Helena, California (2002)
Chelsea Loft, New York, New York (2002)
Cambridge Conversion, Cambridge, Massachusetts (2002)
Patrizio Residence, Media, Pennsylvania (2002)
Onteora Tower, Tannersville, New York (2001)
Apartment Building, Chicago, Illinois (2001)
Mixed Income Housing, Chicago, Illinois (2000)
Follini Residence, Sag Harbor, New York (1998)
Housing Prototypes, Atlantic City, New Jersey (1998)
Beach House, Long Beach Island, New Jersey (1996)
Summer Compound, Long Beach Island, New Jersey (1994)
Small Lodge, Saint Helena, California (1994)
Sandy Cove, Long Beach Island, New Jersey (1993)
Peron Residence, Long Beach Island, New Jersey (1992)
Erlbaum Residence, Longport, New Jersey (1991)
HZ East, Siasconset, Massachusetts (1991)
Wall House, Saint Helena, California (1991)
Urban Duplex, Watertown, Massachusetts (1990)
House on Buzzards Bay, Dartmouth, Massachusetts (1988)
McLaughlin Residence and Nursery, Fort Myers, Florida (1983)
Healy House and Nursery, Estero, Florida (1982, 1994, 2018)
Institutions & Commercial Work:
Monroe Center for the Arts, Lexington, MA (2022-24)
Jackson Fire, Jackson, New Hampshire (2021)
Ellis River Studio, Jackson, New Hampshire (2018)
Pier 7, Boston, Massachusetts (2014)
Wentworth Innovation Center, Boston, Massachusetts (2013)
Jackson Lab, Farmington, Connecticut (2013)
Press Box / Stadium Additions UMASS Amherst Massachusetts 2012)
E.M. Kennedy Institute, Boston, Massachusetts (2008)
Harvard SEAS, Cambridge, Massachusetts (2007)
Civic Center, Lake Elsinore, California (2007)
Downtown Crossing, Boston, Massachusetts (2003)
Lincoln Street Garage, Boston, Massachusetts (1999)
Urban Prep School, Boston, Massachusetts (1996)
Boston Film, Cambridge, Massachusetts (1988)
Educational Facilities & Civic Venues:
Community Center, Newport, Rhode Island (2019)
Brookline High School, Brookline, Massachusetts (2019)
Children's Enrichment Center, Bentonville, Arkansas (2017)
Student Center, Lowell, Massachusetts (2014)
Stadium Additions, Amherst, Massachusetts (2014)
Entrepreneur Center, Salt Lake City, Utah (2014)
Enfold, Boston, Massachusetts (2012)
Maine Medical Center, Portland, Maine (2012)
Country Day School, Alexandria, Virginia (2012)
BAC Installation, Boston, Massachusetts (2009)
Rose Kennedy Greenway, Boston, Massachusetts (2008)
Fulton Concert Hall, Providence, Rhode Island (2007)
Grant Recital Hall, Providence, Rhode Island (2006)
Mill Center for the Arts, Hendersonville, North Carolina (2004)
Intergenerational Learning Center, Chicago, Illinois (2003)
Frank Lloyd Wright Visitor's Center, Buffalo, New York (2002)
Rural Pool Hall, Boone, North Carolina (1995)
Art Complex, Waltham, Massachusetts (1992)
Town Center, Blacksburg, Virginia (1988)
Religious Buildings:
United Parish of Winchendon, Winchendon, Massachusetts (2020)
Education and Community Center, Brookline, Massachusetts (2010)
Further Reading