May 14th, 2025

Katie Swenson Senior Principal, MASS Design Group

Katie Swenson is a nationally recognized design leader, writer, and educator, and a Senior Principal at MASS Design Group, where she co-leads the Advocacy team. Her work explores how design can be a powerful tool to advance social equity, environmental sustainability, and community health. With over two decades of experience, Katie has shaped the field of public interest design through both practice and mentorship. She is the author of Design with Love: At Home in America and In Bohemia: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Kindness, and co-author of Growing Urban Habitats. A passionate storyteller, Katie uses writing and public speaking to advocate for a more just and beautiful built environment. She is a frequent keynote speaker and moderator at global events focused on architecture, housing, and equity. Before joining MASS, Katie served as Vice President of Design & Sustainability at Enterprise Community Partners, where she led the national Rose Fellowship. She is also the founder of the Charlottesville Community Design Center and currently teaches at the Parsons School of Design at The New School. A 2019 Loeb Fellow at the Harvard GSD, Katie holds a BA in Comparative Literature from UC Berkeley and a Master of Architecture from the University of Virginia. She was awarded the AIA Award for Excellence in Public Architecture in 2021.

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Designing a Life: A Mother-Daughter Conversation on Architecture, Purpose and Becoming.

In celebration of Mother’s Day, Katie Swenson, Senior Principal at MASS Design Group, and her daughter Liv Vernon, a junior designer at Marvel Designs, will reflect on what it means to live a life shaped by architecture—across generations. Katie and Liv will share their experiences navigating architecture as both a profession and a lens through which they see the world. From the design studio to the dinner table, they’ll explore how values of creativity, equity, community, and care have informed their journeys—individually and together. The conversation will delve into mentorship, identity, purpose, and the evolving role of women in architecture, offering insights into how we define success and fulfillment in both work and life.