New England Design Hall of Fame 2016: Joeb Moore

The 2016 New England Design Hall of Fame Inductees

Greenwich, Connecticut architect Joeb Moore is a 2016 inductee into the New England Design Hall of Fame.

Architect, intellectual, visionary: Joeb Moore has been elevating architecture to new heights for decades. Moore’s work explores “the interface between the social and the physical, between convention and invention, and between art and construction.” He is committed to the ideal that “architecture is a material and social art that deftly engages with the visual, social, and political history and culture of which it is an active part.”

In intellectual terms, Moore uses his craft as a way to relate the symbolic with the actual. And in real terms, he has built up an incredible collection of thoughtful, complex, and striking residential buildings.

Take, for example, the extraordinary Bridge House, located along a 300-foot ridge that parallels Connecticut’s Housatonic River and Kent Falls State Park. The primary living space is a floating wood form anchored into the hillside by two mirroring concrete buttress structures with dual hearths. “The house,” says Moore, “which is suspended between land and air, oscillates between a tree house, a campground, and a cave, providing a perfect escape from hectic urban life.”

It’s no surprise that Moore’s work has landed him more than fifty regional and national architecture and design awards. An authority on modernist architecture, he lectures on the topic frequently and is an adjunct professor of architecture in the Barnard/Columbia Undergraduate Architecture Department and a visiting professor at the Yale School of Architecture.

Ever a student himself, Moore continues to evolve his craft, both in theoretical and practical terms. “Experience is eccentric, and architecture is an act of relations where the symbolic confronts the real,” he says. “Our design work and process seeks to deepen human experience, engage our prosaic rituals, and elevate our awareness of a larger, changing world.”