Carlo Parente
Areas of Specialization
Architectural design
Design communication
Performance-based design
Architectural practice
Spotlight
When Carlo Parente was a student at DAS in the late 1990鈥檚, he never could have predicted just how far his career would take him鈥攐r how full-circle. After running his own studio in Toronto, completing his master鈥檚 degree and teaching in Chicago, he joined a major firm and led massive projects around the world, including an office headquarters complex in China and a 60-storey residential tower adjacent to the Burj Khalifa site in Dubai. While he enjoyed the collaboration and the challenge of these large-scale projects, he longed for something different. 鈥淚 missed designing for communities,鈥� he says. 鈥淚 missed those smaller buildings that everyone can enjoy.鈥�
So Parente changed his path. He returned to teaching and he opened a practice that gave him the freedom to collaborate on creative projects of all scales that engage entire neighbourhoods. He also returned to DAS, only this time as a professor. 鈥淭his program taught me how to be rigorous and curious; and it made me a well-rounded architect,鈥� he says. 鈥淚鈥檓 excited to help my own students develop those skills, too.鈥�
鈥淎rchitecture is a framework for people to transform; it has a life of its own.鈥�
- Co-President, Chicago Architectural Club
- Carlo Parente Architect