Team

Katherine founded Latent in 2010 to advance social and spatial justice. Based in Chicago, her firm has designed award winning buildings throughout the Midwest to restore community access to food, public space, housing, policy and equity. The firm has been published, exhibited, and featured widely, most recently as the Architectural League of New York Emerging Voices, RIBA 100 Women Architects book, and Architect’s Newspaper Best of Practice for Small Firms in the Midwest. She previously taught at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Northwestern University.

For over 25 years Nicolas has designed and built a diverse range of Class A Office, Luxury and Affordable Residential, Community Centers, Hospitality, Education, Adaptive Reuse, Interiors, Exhibition, and Planning Projects throughout the United States, Europe, Middle East, and Asia. He has led talented teams of consultants and engineers to deliver clients award-winning projects totaling over $3bn in construction cost. Nicolas values quality design as an iterative process informed by the forces of site, circumstance, culture, climate, program, and function. 

Inspired by the psychology behind architecture, Damla’s communication thrives among visuals, like graphics, diagrams, and renderings, translating aesthetics to one's mental and emotional wellbeing upon entering spaces. As an urban and architectural designer, Damla is committed to eco-conscious design and aims to foster a future where style, functionality, and environmental responsibility seamlessly converge. In addition to producing safe and approachable spaces, Damla aims to prioritize sustainable design solutions that offer positive impact on both physical and emotional levels.

A dynamic thinker and hands-on architectural designer, Emily prides herself on creating spaces that behave, perform, and feel exceptional yet grounding. Emily graduated from Illinois Tech, and revels in taking on tasks that might not have straightforward solutions, which pushes her to pave a way to what's possible. Emily excels in visualizing the lines she initially sketches as the built-out the walls people might lean on for years to come; she sees this indirect interaction with the public as a privilege and motivation to pursue innovative projects. 

With versatility as one of her several strengths, Lucie understands architecture as an exceptional intersection of art, science, and engineering. As an architectural designer, she has experience across a wide range of typologies and scales such as adaptive reuse, mixed-use, transportation, high-rise residential, infill housing, and interior design. Lucie appreciates the intimacy of small details in a project and finding transformative ways to reinvest back into its community by revitalizing spaces. Prior to her time in practice, Lucie studied architecture at Virginia Tech and won multiple awards for her thesis project which explored the blurred, unstable boundaries between the real and the virtual. 

Joe received his formal start as an arborist by earning a Bachelor of Science from SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in natural resources management. With previous experience as an assistant City Forester for the City of Highland Park, Joe oversaw tree purchasing, sustainable targeting, and management of maintenance contractors. He also preserved and maintained historical and memorial trees on U.S. Capitol Grounds as an arborist for The Architect of the Capitol in Washington, D.C. for several years. Joe recognizes the long-term innovation needed to care for biodiversity and finds the most rewarding part of forestry is witnessing the ways trees respond to preservation over time.

Anthony specializes in the multi-dimensional benefits of planting, emphasizing planting design and biodiversity as not just accessorizing, but infrastructure. As a licensed landscape architect, he maintains credentials as a certified arborist and excels at interdisciplinary collaboration across his team and when serving the public realm, including spaces dedicated to transportation and recreation. Though it may take years for Anthony's designs to grow into fruition, his vision embodies a sense of magnificence that embodies beauty, wellness, and equity all while working within Midwestern ecosystems.

Medinah has engineering expertise creating technical drawings of fiber optics, MEP, and other complex infrastructure systems. Her synergetic attitude and ambitious spirit meld to not only enhance her design process but inspire others in the industry to believe they are capable of professional advancement, regardless of background. In addition to holding an Associate of Arts and Sciences and CADD Drafting degrees from Moraine Valley, her work can be traced to several Chicago staples including, the Obama Presidential Center, Shedd Aquarium, and the current CTA Red Line expansion.