Studio.
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Founded in 2017, Mary Duggan is an architectural studio recognised for producing rigorous, idea-led work for forward-thinking clients. The practice is driven by clear reasoning and precise design communication, consistently challenging architectural convention while foregrounding human experience, ethical practice, and the agency of materials.

Mary Duggan provides architectural input across multiple stages of a project, from early concept design and strategic visioning to conceptual guardianship and the delivery of traditional architectural commissions. The studio frequently works at the formative stages of projects, shaping spatial, material, and organisational ideas that can guide development over time and across disciplines.

The practice is particularly engaged with landscape-led design programmes, where architecture is conceived as part of a broader environmental and social field. Projects explore how buildings emerge from, respond to, and structure their landscapes, rather than sitting apart from them. One such scheme – Lion Green Road – has been described by Rowan Moore, architecture critic of The Observer as ‘. . . the latest example of thoughtful, visionary housing design the government would do well to learn from.’

Central to the studio’s approach is an evolving anthropological perspective on design. Mary Duggan is developing methods that draw on material culture and ethnographic thinking, using deeper, material-led enquiry to understand how people inhabit, negotiate, and attribute meaning to spaces. This research-driven approach informs both built work and strategic advisory roles, allowing architecture to operate as a social and material practice rather than a purely formal one.

Research and development is embedded within the studio’s ethos through a residency programme (2019–2022), ongoing engagement with architectural education, and participation in international design discourse, including the construction of an experimental pavilion at the Versailles Biennale 2022.

Current projects include a horticultural education facility for The Hepworth Wakefield in Yorkshire and a threshold structure and garden enclosure for The Garden Museum in the London Borough of Westminster.

Mary Duggan, Director.
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Mary is currently a member of several Design Review Panels including the London Borough of Waltham Forest and the London Borough of Camden. She has also served on many other design panels and juries including the London Borough of Lewisham, the RIBA Education Committee, RIBA International, National and Regional Awards Panels, the London Festival of Architecture, the Stephen Lawrence Prize, and the Manser Medal.

Prior to establishing Mary Duggan Architects, Mary was a founding director of Duggan Morris Architects where she co-led the practice from 2004-2017. During her tenure Duggan Morris Architects received numerous industry awards for design excellence, including ten RIBA National and Regional Awards, three Civic Trust Awards, three Nominations for the European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture – Mies van der Rohe Award, The Stephen Lawrence Prize, The Manser Medal and consideration for the RIBA Stirling Prize for three buildings.

In 2013, Mary was nominated for Woman Architect of the Year.

Selected Talks.
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Design by thinking of the margins of practice, Tolhuistuin, Amsterdam 2026
Sostenibilidad/Barcelona School of Architecture 2025
A+ Architecture in Belgium/Centre for Fine Arts, Brussels 2023
For the Love of Materials/Peter Rice Lecture, Queens University Belfast 2023
Aesthetics & Solidarity/Open23 Solidarity, Aarhus School of Architecture 2023
Demands of our Times/Fritzschumacher Gesellschaft Series, Hamburg 2022.
Material concerns/Arkitektenes Hus OAF Series, Oslo 2021.
Dear house/Porto Academy, Porto 2021.
Wunderkammer/Architecture on Stage, Barbican Centre 2018.
A dialogue with Kate Macintosh/RIBA, London 2018.
Five projects/Univesitat de Girona 2018.
Does identity matter/LFA Lecture Series 2018.
Building on Bauhaus/Royal Academy, 2018.
Scale/Trinity College, Dublin 2018.
Five themes/Mackintosh Lecture Series, Glasgow School of Art, 2018.
Reflections/Air Rotterdam, Rotterdam 2017.

Writing, Exhibitions & Interviews.
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A contribution to The Bank of England in Ruins by Sam Jacob Studio 2025.
Office Talk /David Sharp Podcast  2024.
A pavilion made of gypsum, then stone & wood/Versailles Biennale 2022.
Shaping Space, The Building Centre 2021.
Oscillating Thoughts, Mary Duggan/OASE 106 July 2020.
Interview with Mary Duggan/Scaffold Podcast Episode 24, 2019.
A Home for All: Six Experiments in Social Housing/Victoria & Albert 2018-19.
Mirabilia, Interpretations of Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities/Italy 2018.
Interview with Mary Duggan/Architecture Masters Podcast Episode 4, 2017.

Research & Academia.
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Architectural Association School of Architecture 2025 / University of Lancaster 2022-2024 / Porto Academy Summer School, Studio Leader 2021 / University of Kingston 2021 / Univesitat de Girona Summer School 2018 / Brighton University 2015-2019 / Oxford Brookes University 2015-2017 / Bartlett School of Architecture 2014-2015.
Residency Programme, Mary Duggan, 2017-2020.