Marianne O’Brien

Marianne O’Brien, FAIA, is 2014 President of the American Institute of Architects, San Francisco and a Principal with the San Francisco office of SmithGroupJJR, a leading national design and engineering firm. She holds multiple degrees from the University of Minnesota and has been a practitioner for more than thirty years. Recognized as an insightful and collaborative leader who is at the same time incisive and unafraid of a challenge, her project work leans toward complex projects with demanding schedules and/or delivery methodologies. Recent project work include UCSF’s Regeneration Medicine Building in partnership with Rafael Viñoly Architects (which won numerous delivery and design awards) and the just-opened Dugoni School of Dentistry. Marianne was a panelist at the opening general session of the Design-Build Institute of America (DBIA) national conference and has presented nationally and internationally at Tradeline, SCUP, and AIA conferences. Marianne served as a juror for AIA Awards, ENR’s Best of the Best projects in 2011, and for structural engineering awards. Her leadership and management skills made her one of the top 25 national Newsmakers of 2010 by ENR Magazine and keep her in demand today for demanding and complex projects.