Elena Manferdini

In 2011, Elena Manferdini was one of the recipients of the prestigious annual grants from the United States Artists (USA) in the category of architecture and design. Manferdini was awarded the 2013 COLA Fellowship given by City of Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs to support the production of original artwork. That same year, she received a Graham Award for architecture, the 2013 ACADIA Innovative Research Award of Excellence, and was selected as recipient for the Educator of the Year presidential award given by the AIA Los Angeles.

She joined the faculty of the Southern California Institute of Architecture in 2003, where she is now the Graduate Program Chair.

Manferdini was raised in Bologna, Italy, where she graduated from the University of Civil Engineering in 1999 and later received her Master of Architecture and Urban Design from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2000. Manferdini has been teaching at SCI-Arc since 2003, serving most recently as Coordinator of Graduate Thesis before taking on the role of Graduate Programs Chair. Manferdini has been acknowledged with prestigious appointments such as the Howard Friedman Visiting Professor of Practice at the University of California Berkeley (UCB) and various Visiting Professor Positions at Cornell University, the University of Pennsylvania and Seika University. Manferdini founded her Los Angeles based firm, Atelier Manferdini, in 2004. The office has gone on to completing projects in the US, Europe and Asia.

Elena Manferdini (born 12 September 1974) is an Italian architect based in Venice, California, where she is the principal and owner of Atelier Manferdini. She is the Graduate Programs Chair at the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc). She has over fifteen years of professional experience that span across architecture, art, design, and education.