Zoka Zola Architecture + Urban Design

Zoka Zola was born in Rijeka, Croatia. Zola holds a Master of Architecture degree from University at Zagreb and a Master degree from the Division of Humanities at the University of Chicago. Zola is a licensed architect in Illinois, USA, UK and Croatia.

In 1997, Zola moved to Chicago where she first realized the Pfanner House. The house won the Home of the Year Award as the best house in North America by Architecture magazine and was included in “American Masterworks - Houses of the 20th and 21st centuries” by Kenneth Frampton as one of 43 houses built in USA in the last 140 years. Her practice’s other work includes three zero energy houses (one in Chicago and two in Kuala Lumpur), a solar tower in Chicago, a Web 2.0 open source web site, an urban plan for the entire city of Chicago, a number of prototypes for residential and educational buildings, a zero-energy training center with hostel in South China, and most recently the realization of a winning competition proposal for affordable housing in Croatia. 

 In Chicago, Zola taught architecture at The School of the Art Institute and the University of Illinois in Chicago, and she is currently teaching at the Illinois institute of Technology. Zola’s work is published and exhibited in numerous venues and publications on five continents.

Services Provided:

- Owner assistance with: site evaluation, formulation of design brief, zoning and building permits, contract administration, site overseeing, post occupation evaluation.

- Site analyzes, concept design, schematic design, design development, construction drawings, coordination of various consultants, site supervision.