Shelley McNamara

Together with Yvonne Farrell, McNamara established Grafton Architects in Dublin in 1978,[8] naming it after Grafton Street in the city.[9] As of 2017, the practice employed 25 people, with McNamara and Farrell leading the designs.[4] They use weighty materials, including stone and concrete, to form spacious buildings which encourage interactions between people.[2] McNamara described her approach to architecture as "rather than thinking of a space and then finding a structure for it, we make a structure and that, in turn, makes a space"[2] and "the enjoyment in architecture is the sense of weight being borne down or supported".[4]

The Röntgen Building by Grafton architects at Bocconi University in Milan

The pair have specialised in buildings for higher education, having designed buildings for universities in Toulouse, Limerick, London and others.[2][4] These include teaching buildings, medical schools, and student accommodation.[4] They drew international attention with a building for Bocconi University in Milan, which was completed in 2008.[7] Their most celebrated building was for the Universidad de Ingeniería y Tecnología in Peru, which won the RIBA International Prize in 2016, as the best new building in the world that year.[2]

The practice has also produced dozens of buildings in Ireland, for residential and commercial purposes as well as higher education.[7]

McNamara has worked as a studio lecturer at the School of Architecture in UCD since 1976. Shortly after graduating from University College, Dublin, McNamara began teaching at the school along with Yvonne Farrell, where she taught consistently between 1976 and 2002. In 2015, McNamara became an adjunct professor at UCD.[10]

In addition to UCD, McNamara has been a visiting professor at Oxford Brookes University, Accademia di Architettura di Mendrisio (2008– 2010), Oslo, and the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (2010–2011). She became a full professor at Mendrisio in 2013. In 2010, McNamara held the Kenzo Tange Chair at Harvard Graduate School of Design and the Louis Kahn Chair at Yale University in Fall 2011. She served as an external examiner at Cambridge University and The London Metropolitan School of Architecture. In addition to teaching, McNamara has lectured widely in European and American Schools of Architecture.[11]

McNamara, together with Yvonne Farrell, published the book Dialogue and Translation: Grafton Architects in 2014. This book comprises the firm's work, architectural musings and a collection of lectures delivered at Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation. It includes a critical commentary from Kenneth Frampton.[12]