Amenta Emma Architects

Amenta Emma Architects is a Connecticut design firm with offices in Hartford and beyond, working across higher education, workplace, civic and residential projects. The practice pairs a clear modern sensibility with a focus on how people actually use space, which has made it a regular on New England campus and community projects. Amenta Emma designed the renovation of the University of Saint Joseph library and welcome center in West Hartford, turning aging stacks into a flexible learning commons. It’s the kind of mid-sized, design-forward studio that colleges and municipalities turn to when a building needs to work as hard as it looks.

Amenta Emma Architects was founded in 1985 by Anthony Amenta and Robert Emma, and today the firm operates from its Hartford headquarters alongside studios in Boston and New York City.

The practice organizes its work around six sectors: academic, commercial, civic, senior living, multifamily residential and workplace design. That range shows up in how the firm presents itself, less as a single-market specialist and more as a partner that moves between institutional, corporate and residential clients within the same portfolio.

In 2026, Amenta Emma achieved the WELL Equity Rating from the International WELL Building Institute. The firm frames this as a formal commitment to designing for diversity, equity and inclusion, extending from internal parental leave policies to evidence-based strategies for healthier, more welcoming spaces.

The firm’s design work has also drawn regional recognition. At the 2025 AIA Connecticut Design Awards, Amenta Emma received four honors, which the firm says reflect both design excellence and its approach to inclusion and collaboration during the design process.

Leadership continuity is part of the firm’s current growth story: in 2026, Amenta Emma promoted Alexis Hoff, AIA, NOMA to Associate and Thomas Barker, AIA to Senior Associate, citing their technical expertise and leadership within the practice.

Amenta Emma describes its mission as making positive impacts through inspired design, built on a process the firm characterizes as rigorous, research-driven and shaped by close collaboration with each client’s culture and goals. The firm also names justice, equity, diversity, inclusion and belonging as a core value, stating a commitment to building teams that reflect the communities it serves so that finished spaces better honor those communities. That approach spans the firm’s three studio locations, giving clients across the Northeast access to a single design team working on academic, civic, senior living and workplace projects alike.