Michael Murphy

Michael P. Murphy, Int FRIBA, is an architect, educator, and writer dedicated to reimagining how the built environment shapes our lives. In 2024, he launched AMMA, a collaborative design and development agency working across spatial disciplines.

For nearly 20 years, Murphy has been fascinated by how we shape space, and how spaces shape us. He has designed and built projects in over a dozen countries, earning global recognition for his work. His notable projects include The National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama; The Butaro District Hospital in Rwanda; and ‘The Embrace’ memorial on Boston Common, created in collaboration with artist Hank Willis Thomas. These and other landmark projects were completed during his tenure at MASS Design Group, the nonprofit organization which he co-founded in 2007 and led until 2022.

After being awarded AIA Firm of the Year in 2022, Murphy stepped down from his role at MASS to pursue new initiatives that focus on how to finance and share the ownership of the world around us— a design problem that architecture has yet to solve. In 2024, while serving as Thomas W Ventulett III Distinguished Chair of Architectural Design at Georgia Tech, he founded AMMA, a collaborative design and development agency focused on transforming the whole supply chain of the built environment.

Over the last two years, Murphy and his collaborative teams have been working for governments, institutions, nonprofits, and developers on a range of projects from buildings, to sculptures, to startups. AMMA’s first built project, the Oceana Innovation Hub in Barbados, opened this summer for the XQ Institute and the Government of Barbados. The project deployed a modular, climate resilient design strategy to transform the education system of a nation island facing increasing storms and repercussions from a warming planet.

In addition to his design practice and ongoing academic work, his next book, Our World in Ten Buildings, will be published by Simon & Schuster in Spring 2026.