2025 BROOKLYN Design Awardees

AIA Brooklyn Announces 2025 Brooklyn Design Awards Winners

Brooklyn Architecture: Where the environment shapes design and designers shape the environment.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE DECEMBER 9, 2025

Brooklyn, NY — The Brooklyn Chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA Brooklyn) is proud to announce the winners of the 2025 Brooklyn Design Awards. This year, 9 projects have been recognized with distinctions of “Excellence,” “Merit,” or “Commendation” for their exceptional contributions to design, innovation, environmental responsiveness, technical skill, and social impact.

Eligibility for the program required projects to be built in Brooklyn or completed by Brooklyn-based architects or designers. The winners include a range of residential projects alongside academic and cultural facilities. Just over half of the winning projects are located in Brooklyn, while the remaining honors were awarded to Long Island, Manhattan and North Carolina projects.

The Brooklyn Design Awards celebrate the borough as a hub of progressive thought and forward-thinking design. The adjacency of the borough’s diverse neighborhoods and rich cultural institutions fertilize an ecosystem of creativity and exploration that draws an international collection of artists, architects, designers and makers of every description.

“Brooklyn Architecture and Brooklyn-made design continue to flourish, as the Borough itself continues to grow in prominence in Music, the Arts and Architecture. This year’s Design Awards Program reflects that growth in both the quantity and the quality of the entries submitted and reflected in the winning entries shown here,” said Tom Lewis, Chair of the 2025 Brooklyn Design Awards.

The festive awards ceremony was held at 501 Union in Gowanus, Brooklyn on December 8. The co-emcees were Tom Lewis and Chelsea Davis, both directors at AIA Brooklyn, and the event featured remarks by AIA Brooklyn chapter President, Marshall Shuster, as well as the incoming President of AIA National, Ilya Azaroff.

This year’s Brooklyn Design Awards jury was composed of esteemed design professionals hailing from all over the country, including architects from small and large firms and one real estate developer. The group scrutinized each project in detail, bringing their own interests and expertise to bear before arriving at consensus. The BKDA 2025 Jury:

David Kramer President of the Hudson Companies
David Lee, R.A. Founding Partner of FAME in Los Angeles and co-host of the Second Studio podcast
Kerry Nolan, AIA Principal at Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners
Bretaigne Walliser, AIA Co-founder and principal of TBo Architects
Kim Yao, FAIA Principal of Architecture Research Office (ARO).