Denise Scott Brown - Education and Teaching

Education and Teaching

Born to Jewish parents Simon and Phyllis (Hepker) Lakofski, Denise Lakofski studied first in South Africa at the University of the Witwatersrand from 1948 to 1952, where she met her future husband, Robert Scott Brown. Lakofski traveled to London in 1952 and continued her education at the Architectural Association School of Architecture. She was joined there by Scott Brown in 1954, and graduated with a degree in architecture in 1955. Denise and Robert Scott Brown were married on July 21, 1955. The couple spent the next three years working and traveling throughout Europe. In 1958, the Scott Browns came to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to study at the University of Pennsylvania's planning department. In 1959, Robert Scott Brown was killed in an auto accident. Denise Scott Brown completed her master's degree in city planning in 1960 and became a faculty member at the university upon graduation. She completed a master's degree in architecture while teaching. At a 1960 faculty meeting, Scott Brown met Robert Venturi, a young architect and faculty member, when she spoke against demolishing the university's library, designed by Philadelphia architect Frank Furness. The two became collaborators and taught courses together from 1962-1964.

Scott Brown left the University of Pennsylvania in 1965. Becoming known as a scholar in urban planning, she taught at the University of California, Berkeley, and was then named co-chair of the Urban Design Program at the University of California, Los Angeles. Scott Brown later taught at Yale University, and in 2003 was a visiting lecturer with Venturi at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design. During her years in the Southwest, Scott Brown became interested in the newer cities of Los Angeles and Las Vegas. She invited Venturi to visit her classes at UCLA, and in 1966 asked him to visit Las Vegas with her. The two were married in Santa Monica, California on July 23, 1967. Scott Brown moved back to Philadelphia in 1967 to join her husband's firm, Venturi and Rauch, and became principal in charge of planning in 1969.