Brian Vitale

Brian Vitale is the managing director of the Chicago office of global design firm, Gensler, and one of the firm’s most influential and awarded designers. He has authored some of the firm’s most significant and diverse work, including the Gratz Center at Fourth Presbyterian Church, the Kohler Creative Communications building, the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab, Columbia College Chicago’s Student Center and the University of Kansas’s Capitol Federal Hall. A firm believer in the benefits of blurring the line between academia and professional worlds, Brian has served as adjunct design faculty at the University of Illinois Chicago, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, where in 2015, he delivered the keynote speech at the School of Architecture’s convocation ceremony. He has received multiple awards, including the prestigious Chicago AIA Dubin Family Young Architect Award and the National AIA Young Architect Award. In 2020, Brian was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of the Arts from Columbia College Chicago for his transformative work.