Olayinka Dosekun-Adjei, cofounder and creative director of 2023 Design Vanguard firm Studio Contra, is one of nine featured speakers at RECORD’s upcoming Innovation Conference in New York.

Based in Brooklyn's Gowanus neighborhood, husband-and-wife partners Nicholas and Deirdre McDermott founded their firm “on the belief that the future provides us with opportunity to constantly improve on the past.”

Founded in 2016 by Zhou Suning, Tang Tao, and Wu Ziye, the Nanjing-based practice got its start in rural China, where government investment aims to revitalize areas that have long suffered from lagging economic development and depopulation. 

These 10 emerging practices from across the U.S., Mexico, Germany, China, Japan, Nigeria, and Australia represent the promise of the next generation of architects.

A decade into their shared practice, Mexico City–born Ingrid Moye and Berlin-born Christoph Zeller use their bicontinental arrangement to execute projects in both Latin America and Europe, allowing their experiences to inform one another.

Based in Hong Kong and Shanghai, Briar Hickling and Alex Mok of Linehouse build site-sensitive projects around knowledge of local materials and Chinese craftsmanship.

According to firm principal J. Jih, whose studio works out of a converted warehouse in Boston’s South End arts district, architecture is a place “to dissect value, encounter the values of others, and continually evolve one’s own values.”

Classmates Millie Anderson and Jimmy Carter began moonlighting on small freelance projects—today, Office MI–JI has introduced a refreshing new approach to the Melbourne design scene and completed several intriguing projects in low-cost local materials.

Among other projects, Brent Linden and Chris Brown's Portland-based firm has transformed a postwar house into a new residence and home studio for a local design business.

For the young Tokyo architect, who worked under Kengo Kuma for a decade, integrating natural elements with concrete, glass, and steel has become second nature.