Chad Kraus

Chad Kraus, AIA, is a Professor of Architecture at the University of Kansas, a licensed architect, and a leading voice in designbuild education. He directs the KU Designbuild Institute and Studio 804, the internationally recognized graduate designbuild program, and previously founded and directed the award-winning, community-engaged Dirt Works Studio. His teaching and scholarship center on designbuild pedagogy, material research, and the capacity of architecture to engage pressing environmental and social challenges through making. His work explores innovative applications of earthen materials, mass timber, and other low-carbon material systems.

Kraus is the editor of the book Designbuild Education (Routledge, 2017) and served as editor of Technology | Architecture + Design (TAD) from 2017 to 2023. Before joining academia, he worked for Pritzker Prize laureate and AIA Gold Medal recipient Shigeru Ban and studied architectural history and theory under Alberto Pérez-Gómez at McGill University. His practice, teaching, and research are united by a commitment to hands-on learning, material experimentation, and the belief that architecture is most meaningful when ideas are tested through the realities of making.