Irene Cheng
Assistant Professor, Architecture and Interior Design, California College of the Arts
Irene Cheng is an architectural historian and critic, and an assistant professor of architecture at California College of the Arts. Her research focuses on the intersections of architecture, cultural history, politics, and the history of science. Her current project, entitled “The Shape of Utopia: Architectures of Radical Reform in Nineteenth-Century America,” explores the geometry of architectural projects affiliated with anarchist, socialist, abolitionist, free love, spiritualist, and other radical antebellum movements. Cheng is co-creator of Museum of the Phantom City, an iPhone app that enables users to explore utopian projects in New York, San Francisco, and Chicago. Cheng holds a B.A. in Social Studies from Harvard University, and an M.Arch and Ph.D from Columbia University.