Out on the Mesa
Architect's Newspaper
Studio Ma, an architecture and environmental design firm located in the Phoenix neighborhood of Arcadia, has established itself as one of the country’s leaders in sustainable design over the past two decades. The firm was founded by principals Christiana Moss, Christopher Alt, and Dan Hoffman in 2003. After graduating from Cornell University, they opted for Arizona’s desert, finding the arid landscape and its mesa formations to be suitable ground for experiment.
“To be in a place like the desert, you really have to think about where the sun is in the sky and your water is coming from and where it goes” Moss told AN. “And in that process, we ultimately consider how the built environment responds to place.”
That methodology is imprinted across the firm’s body of work, much of which is located in its home state of Arizona, although several notable projects lie father afield, such as their work on the Cranbrook Institute of Science in Michigan. Together, the projects effuse a modern Frank Lloyd Wright spirit, who ultimately called this slice of the Southwest home.