studio d'ARC architects was established in 1996 by Gerard Damiani with a vision of creating an architect's collaborative to pursue the integration of architectural ideas with the craft of building set within an open design process that engages all participants -- from clients and consultants, to fabricators, material suppliers, builders and artists. This collaborative approach allows for thoughtful, integrated, and cost effective solutions for which all involved can take pride in their accomplishments.

To pursue architecture that goes beyond the conventional goals of service and product, the firm operates on the belief that all projects can be important works of architecture, regardless of scale or budget. Through the act of speculation and desire to reconsider every project's assumptions as well as its existing context, studio d'ARC develops architectural solutions that are specific to the client's budget and program and often exceed the client's conceptual and aesthetic vision.

SDA provides expertise in commercial, residential, and university construction and adaptive re-use and renovation. SDA also encourages and promotes artist-architect collaborations through public art installations.

Gerard Damiani, AIA NCARB
Gerard Damiani is the founder and president of studio d'ARC architects, P.C. in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. A graduate of Syracuse University where he received his Bachelor of Architecture degree with honors, Gerard is an NCARB certified, registered architect with professional licenses in New York and Pennsylvania. Since 1996 his work has focused on the reinterpretation and reformation of the post-industrial context of Pittsburgh into new environments specific to their twenty-first century uses -- from high-tech office spaces, residences, and collegiate spaces to artists' studios, architect/artist collaborations, and exhibition installations. These works, as well as new projects, continue to draw important clues from their context to find an architecture that is inseparable from its time, place and participants.

Over the years Gerard's work has resulted in many local awards from the Pittsburgh American Institute of Architects (AIA) chapter as well as Pittsburgh Magazine's Superior Interiors annual awards program. More recently, he has received national recognition from organizations such as the National AIA and AIA Pennsylvania, as well as international architectural publications such as Azure Magazine and Architectural Review. His own Live/Work Studio II was published in Architectural Review's January 2009 issue in an article devoted to a selection of houses from the 2008 AR Awards for Emerging Architects; it was also selected as one of six houses representing the current state of international residential architecture in Azure Magazine's Annual Houses issue published in January 2008, for which it was also selected as the cover image.

Gerard has also been recognized for his contributions to the region outside of the awards programs. In 2008 a number of his projects including the Live/Work Studio II were featured in the publication, "Dream Homes Ohio and Pennsylvania." In collaboration with sound artist Jeremy Boyle, he won the Phase II Strawberry Way Public Art Installation in downtown Pittsburgh, completed in 2005. His own Live/ Work Studio II was on display as part of the Pittsburgh Platforms exhibition at the Carnegie Museum of Art's Heinz Architectural Center and From the Ground Up exhibition at Rockhurst University in Kansas City, both in 2003. In the spring of 2003, Gerard was selected as one of twenty-two individuals whose work in the built environment has lead to advancements in the visual arts in the Pittsburgh region. His installation entitled "An investigation into the particular" was on display at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts 2003 Biennial. His innovations in urban housing and construction techniques have been profiled in The City of Pittsburgh Development Report "Imagine the Possibilities" for 2001/2002. In 2000, he was chosen as one of "40 Under 40," an awards program created by Pittsburgh Magazine and PUMP (Pittsburgh Urban Magnet Project) to recognize people who are positively impacting the Pittsburgh region.

Committed to the education of architects as he is to the practice of architecture, Gerard has taught both full-time and adjunct since 1992 at Syracuse University, Carnegie Mellon University, and Kansas State University. Gerard has been an adjunct professor in architectural design at Carnegie Mellon University where he has taught and/or coordinated first, second and fifth year (thesis) design studios since 1996. In 2007 he was given a special appointment as Adjunct Professor of Practice and was asked to holistically revise the first year fall curriculum; for the spring semester he was asked to develop an undergraduate thesis studio as the culmination of the five-year program at Carnegie Mellon, which he continues to teach. He was also a visiting faculty member at Kansas State University in the fall of 2003 in the fourth year design curriculum where he also taught a course on mid-century modern architecture and previously taught first year design studios and drawing courses at Syracuse University from 1992 through 1994. In addition to his teaching commitment, Gerard has co-coordinated and co-led a two-week student trip to India to study the works of Le Corbusier, as well as Louis Kahn, in May 2007 and was a guest seminar instructor for the Summer 2008 Venice program on the topic of The Vertical Surface Compositions of Venetian Pallazzi and the Work of Giuseppe Terragni. He has been invited as a guest juror at Yale University, University of Pennsylvania, Syracuse University, Kent State University, University of Tennessee, and the Boston Architectural Center. As an author, he has contributed articles to "Oz", the Kansas State University architectural periodical as well as the University of Virginia's architectural publication, "Modulus."

Debbie Battistone
Since 1998, Debbie Battistone has been involved in many studio d'ARC projects as a staff architect including assisting on the adaptive re-use of the Goodyear Building at Dickinson College, The Attic (a student social space) at Gettysburg College as well as the Sportsworks proposal.

Since 2005, her role at SDA is as project manager / office manager where she acts as the day-to-day contact for many projects. She has been the project manager for Trax, the student social space at Susquehanna University, as well as a team member for the Koch Residence, Zwillinger Residence, Blackbird Artists Studios in Lawrenceville, the warehouse conversion for the Shaheen/Tracht residence in the South Side neighborhood of Pittsburgh, the Strawberry Way Public Art installation, "V 24/7/365" in downtown Pittsburgh, as well as a new office building for Sota Construction, a green general construction company/ development firm in Pittsburgh, which features many environmental strategies and materials in its design and construction.

Her background includes working as a staff urban designer and project manager for Urban Design Associates, a nationally recognized Pittsburgh-based urban design and planning firm where she managed public participatory urban design projects. Debbie received her undergraduate education in business, with a minor in architecture, from Carnegie Mellon University and her Master of Architecture degree from Syracuse University.