Our Team
Robert Claiborne Partner, Architect BArch | MArch | Architect, AAA | MRAIC | AIA | NCARB Calgary

Robert is an award-winning architect with more than 25 years of international experience, particularly in civic, cultural, and urban spaces. His commitment to architecture and authentically understanding each project comes from a deep interest in the challenges and opportunities of our time. Robert’s work relates architecture to the forces that influence each project. By engaging site and environment, program, context, and client, he finds unique and inspired design responses to these conditions that allow each building to express a greater cultural meaning.  A consistent voice for the confluence between architecture and the arts, his approach reinforces the role of creativity as a catalyst for building more sustainable, resilient, and inclusive communities.

As a design leader guiding overall project visions, Robert works closely with clients and colleagues and fosters a strong and dedicated team ethos. He is invested in a cross-disciplinary approach to theory and research that bridges the profession and academia. These interests have led to ongoing relationships with the University of Calgary and the Laboratory of Integrative Design, where Robert researches methods of fabrication as well as rethinking the construction processes to minimize waste.

A licensed architect in Alberta and California, Robert developed his own architectural practice in Montreal, Studio 451, focused on cultural projects and international competitions. Before that, he was design lead with Studio Libeskind in Berlin and Los Angeles, where he was intimately involved with many international cultural, institutional, and master planning projects.

Robert has taught architecture for many years at universities including the University of Calgary, McGill University, the University of Toronto, the University of Southern California, and California Polytechnic State University, Pomona. He has also lectured extensively, and his work has been exhibited both in Canada and internationally

What’s your favourite DIALOG initiative?
Aspire showcases our best work from the year and puts it in front of our colleagues and peers for critical discussion.

Where do you find inspiration?
I have been interested and curious about everything for my entire life.

What’s one item you won’t leave home without?
A sketchbook.

What’s one quote you live by?
Architecture never reveals all of its secrets immediately.

What three things would you want with you if you were stranded on a deserted island?
Berlin, New York, and Montreal

I wake each day and tell myself that I know nothing about architecture. This allows me to be curious and open to new ideas.
Education

Master of Architecture
SCI-Arc (Southern California Institute of Architecture)

Bachelor of Architecture
California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo

Certificate in mosaic, fresco, architecture, photography
École d’Arts Américaines

Featured Work

Awards

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