Barbra Neski

Barbara Neski (née Goldberg; January 13, 1928 – March 23, 2025) was an American architect who co-founded the architectural firm Neski Associates with her husband, Julian Neski, in New York City. Neski died on March 23, 2025, at the age of 97.

Education Neski grew up in Highland Park, New Jersey. She received her undergraduate degree from Bennington College in 1949. During her third semester there, she became aware of the nearby Robinson House, in Williamstown, Massachusetts, which Marcel Breuer had designed. It inspired her, suggesting what domestic architecture could be. She went on to earn her Masters of Architecture (M.Arch.) at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design, then directed by Walter Gropius. She found that being a woman in the M.Arch. program was viewed as an “oddity," often not taken seriously. For example, at least one professor, Hugh Stubbins, would completely “ignore [her]” during individual "desk crits" (one-on-one faculty critiques of student work in progress), "not even look[ing] at [her] drawings.”

Early career In 1952, Neski began working in the office of architect José Luis Sert, helping design urban plans for the Latin-America n cities of Bogotá, Colombia, and Havana, Cuba. They moved together to architect Marcel Breuer's office, where she helped develop plans for a factory in Canada, a house in Connecticut, and a library for Hunter College, in New York City. In 1959, the Neskis collaborated on the American National Exhibition in Moscow with an American design team that included Peter Blake, Buckminster Fuller, and Charles and Ray Eames.

Selected works Cates House, Amagansett, NY, 1968 Chalif House, East Hampton, NY, 1964 Sabel House, Bridgehampton, NY 1970 Simon House, Remensberg, 1972 Tivoli Towers housing complex, Brooklyn, NY 1973 Formby House, 1980 Foundation Center, New York, NY, 1985 Nontraditional Employment for Women, New York, NY, 1994