Profiled Firm: Division1 Architects
Location: Washington, DC and New York, NY, USA
When Ali Reza Honarkar faced conservative college professors in the 1990s who emphasized the importance of honoring architecture’s past in his designs, he felt conflicted. He understood that a historical foundation was important, but young Honarkar also felt unduly confined by the approach.
It was during these formative years that his desire to stretch the limits and do things differently was born, and it’s a trait that remains central to how he and his team approach projects today at Division1 Architects in Washington, DC, which he co-founded in 1994, as a provocative response to both a failing economy and what he viewed as the stagnant design culture in the Washington metropolitan area.