Marissa joined GUND Partnership in 2012 and has helped shape many of the firm’s higher education and independent school projects. She has a particular fondness for performing arts spaces. Having been involved in music, theatre and dance from an early age, her use of these spaces helps inform the design of them. She’s equally creative at designing special moments for the front-of-house as she is at designing to the demanding technical requirements for the back-of-house.

She listens to what clients are asking for and interprets that into a building design. Her strengths in space planning and early stage design helps clients better understand the possibilities of their space. Marissa mentors the younger architecture staff in the office and helps manage internal staff and consultant participation on projects.

She has written about adaptive reuse for the publication, College Planning & Management. She received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Columbia University, studied for a year in Spain and received a Master of Architecture degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

At age six, Marissa became fascinated with her family’s home addition project, even developing schematic level drawings for the electrical. Though it wasn’t until college when she took an architecture studio to distract herself from her chemistry major that her career path was set.