I founded JFA in 2010 with a mission to better the human condition through healthier design in our built environments, by taking a holistic approach in understanding human needs. Our need for connection with the natural environment, with ourselves, and with each other, as well as our desire for unique and individual expression. And no less important in this mission was my commitment to creating a workspace with an environment of inspiration, responsibility and freedom. Where we as designers have the ability to bring all of ourselves to the workplace and hence to the work at hand.
I was born and raised in Brooklyn, within the orthodox Jewish community of South Williamsburg. Through my upbringing I came to understand the values of generosity and community. I came to appreciate the responsibility and opportunity that we fellow humans have with each other, and the necessity for the polarities of uniqueness and of togetherness to coexist.
And in me grew a yearning for designing systems and structures that can support human life. Where every building, like every human, can be uniquely its own, paradoxically bold, yet not separate from its environment. In my vision I can see the day where humans and structures live integrated with nature, as eco-systems that are nurturing and life-giving to the individual as to the whole.