Women in Architecture. Why don't we see more women in architecture?
The first practice explainer highlights the position of women in the architectural profession. The achievements of talented women architects are either not mentioned, overshadowed or often mentioned as merely a source of inspiration to the male architect. It took years of hard work for women to achieve recognition in architecture.
So, where are women architects? Why don't we see them more?
Transcript:
One in five women does not recommend the profession of architecture to another woman.
Women who manage to stay in the profession mostly work at lower wahes than men and rarely rise to managerial positions.
This social imbalance is a reflection of history to the present. Women were not welcomed in architecture in the past, and architecture was seen as a male profession for a long time. While men dominated painting, sculpture and architecture, women had to turn to alternative branches such as textiles and ceramics.
American architects defined their profession in the mid-nineteenth century, and women in this scheme were a conspicuous minority with a restricted set of available jobs.
Interestingly, in this system where the social structure keeps women out from the profession, male architects still used the female talent to advance architectural design.
It took years of hard work for women to achieve recognition in the architectural world of men.
Zaha Hadid was the first female architect to win the Pritzker award in 2003. In the following years, Kazuya Sejima, who became the first Asian woman to win this award in 2010 with her male partner, followed by Carme Pigem, who won the prize with her office in 2017, and finally in 2020, Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara were the first women duo to win Pritzker.
Despite the social and systemic developments in the recent years, women account for only 20 percent of the architecture sector. The pandemic was worldwide, but women are more impacted compared to men this time around. The 2020 recession is a “she-session”. As employment dropped by millions, female dominated sectors were hit first.
What causes women to stay behind or leave the profession?
Where are the women architects?
Why don’t we see them more?
