Emma Silverblatt

Emma Silverblatt is an architectural designer whose work explores design activism, public engagement, and participatory production. At Cornell, Silverblatt teaches theory and community-engaged courses, and coedits the Cornell Journal of Architecture. Her multidisciplinary firm, post-, expands the boundaries of spatial practice to interactive media, events, writing, and installations. Her research focuses on alternative forms of housing, grounded in the belief that design has the agency to advance housing as a human right.

Silverblatt previously worked at a number of internationally recognized firms, most recently as an associate at SO – IL, where she led major projects including the Martin Luther King, Jr. Library in Cleveland, Ohio, and coordinated Urban Design Forum and Van Alen Institute's Neighborhoods Now initiative in Jackson Heights, delivering pro-bono design/build services for three years. Prior to that, as a designer at REX, Silverblatt worked on the Perelman Performing Arts Center at the World Trade Center, where she was responsible for developing the marble facade and theater interior scopes.

She holds a B.S. in Architecture from The Ohio State University and an M.Arch I with Commendation from the Harvard Graduate School of Design.

Related Links

• Cornell Journal of ArchitectureOpens a Cornell link

Related News

• Cornell AAP Receives Gift to Endow Judith Kinnard Early Career Design Fellow in Architecture
• Mending the Divide: A Needle, A Thread, and a Future Woven
• Cornell NOMAS Takes Third Place in Annual Student Design Competition
• Engaged Faculty Network Grows with 28 New Fellows
• Peek Inside the Galleries at AAP's Freedom of Expression Show

Classes (Selected)

• ARCH 2302 Analysis II: Architecture, the City, and Landscape
• ARCH 2301 Analysis I: Buildings, Drawings & Texts
• ARCH 4101/4102/5101/5115 Engaged Option Studio: Close to Home
• ARCH 3308/6308 Special Topics in the Theory of Architecture: Public Spaces & Where to Find Them
• ARCH 3308/6308 Special Topics in the Theory of Architecture: visions of utopia

Awards, Grants, and Fellowships (Selected)

• AAP Curricular Innovation Grant (2025)
• Cornell AAP Engaged Research Grant (2025)
• Cornell Einhorn Faculty Fellow in Engaged Scholarship (2024–25)
• Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services: Florence Hoard Community Award (2024)
• Urban Design Forum Forefront Fellowship (2018–19)

Exhibitions and Presentations (Selected)

• "Appreciating Value: Reassessing the Potential of Manufactured Housing." AIA/ACSA Intersections Research Conference: New Housing Paradigms, Austin, Texas (2025)
• Phase Change, Canal Convergence, Scottsdale, Arizona (2024)
• Echo Chamber, Cornell Council of the Arts Freedom of Expression exhibition, Ithaca, New York (2024)

Publications (Selected)

• Silverblatt, Emma, and Reese Greenlee. "Appreciating Value: Reassessing the Potential of Manufactured Housing." In AIA/ACSA Intersections 2025: New Housing Paradigms. [Paper Proceedings of the 2025 AIA/ACSA Intersections Research Conference: NEW HOUSING PARADIGMS (ACSA)], 2025.
• Silverblatt, Emma R. "Systemic Radical Change." In Shelter for All: Homelessness in New York City, The Urban Design Forum, 2020.
• Silverblatt, Emma R. "Il Redentore." Essay. In Andrea Palladio in Los Angeles 01, Vol. 01. Pax Monographs, 2020.