Geoffrey von Oeyen

Geoffrey von Oeyen Design, Principal

von Oeyen Architects, Principal

USC School of Architecture, Associate Professor of Practice

Education:

Harvard University Graduate School of Design, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

M. Arch., Recipient of the Faculty Design Award

University of Cambridge, Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, England.

M. Phil., History and Philosophy of Architecture, US/UK Fulbright Scholar

Stanford University, Palo Alto, California.

A.B. Urban Studies, with Honors. Minors in History and Art History

Geoffrey von Oeyen is a Principal of Geoffrey von Oeyen Design and von Oeyen Architects, based in Los Angeles, and is an Associate Professor of Practice and former Assistant Director of Undergraduate Programs at the USC School of Architecture where he worked to establish the new Bachelor of Science in Architecture + Inventive Technologies degree program. The recipient of multiple national awards including the Architectural League Prize, Next Progressives, and a MacDowell Fellowship, his built architectural projects in North America and Asia have been widely published in international architectural publications such as Architect, Architectural Record, Dezeen, Architizer, and the Architect’s Newspaper.

In 2025, Geoffrey von Oeyen Design was selected as one of ten architecture firms to reimagine the iconic Case Study Program published by Arts & Architecture magazine through Case Study:Adapt and Architectural Digest in response to the January 2025 Los Angeles wildfires. Von Oeyen’s work was exhibited in the 2023 Venice Biennale “Time Space Existence”, curated by the European Cultural Centre. In 2019, Geoffrey von Oeyen Design was internationally longlisted by Dezeen for “Emerging Architect of the Year”, and was selected by the Dezeen readers as one of the top ten firms in all disciplines of architecture, design, and landscape architecture. Built projects range in scale from an outpatient medical campus, Gateway Exchange, to the geometrically precise Case Room and Napavilion, both of which received design awards from the AIA. As a part of his ongoing design research, von Oeyen leads graduate and undergraduate students in multidisciplinary design studios and design-build projects in the United States and China, exploring innovative tectonic systems that leverage precedent, site, and community to reconcile disparate visual, spatial, and cultural conditions, and this work has been awarded and published by organizations such as the American Institute of Architects and the American Composites Manufacturing Association. As President of the Board of Directors of the Los Angeles Forum for Architecture and Urban Design, von Oeyen advocated for culturally and economically resilient housing and urbanism, and has critically explored new systems for housing architecture in Los Angeles, a topic of his graduate design research studios and seminars at USC. 

Prior to founding his practice, von Oeyen was an Associate at Gehry Partners, LLP, where from 2005 to 2011 he played key roles in the design of several geometrically and technically complex institutional projects, including the Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris and the UTS Business School in Sydney. Born in Detroit and raised in Los Angeles, von Oeyen received an M.Arch. from the Harvard Graduate School of Design and accepted the Faculty Design Award, recognizing the most outstanding body of architecture studio projects, as well as the Chair’s Letter of Commendation. Prior to the Harvard GSD he was a U.S.-U.K. Fulbright Scholar at the University of Cambridge, where he received an M.Phil. in the History and Philosophy of Architecture. Von Oeyen’s M.Phil. dissertation extended his funded undergraduate thesis research at Stanford University, where he graduated with Honors in Urban Studies and double minors in Art History and History.